Puerto Rico Governor Hides Behind Motherhood to Fend Off Critics

SAN JUAN — Facing mounting challenges to her administration, Governor Jenniffer González-Colón marked this past Mother’s Day not with flowers, chocolates, or cheesy Hallmark cards, but with a media tour focused on herself. Instead of addressing the real issues women face in Puerto Rico, she used the opportunity to air grievances against her political opponents and blamed her setbacks on “bullying” from members of her party, while not acknowledging her own failings. The message was more about victimhood than motherhood.

On local television programs, she discussed the difficulties of being a new mother to twins and her experience as the second woman elected governor of Puerto Rico. She also wrote an opinion column in the island’s leading newspaper, titled “Mothers Who Do Not Give Up.”  

“On Mother’s Day, I think of all the women who have had to fight twice as hard to prove their ability, commitment, and worth,” she wrote. “These are women who have shouldered responsibilities, criticism, and sacrifices, and still found the strength to keep moving forward. Because being a mother is also about resistance.” 

Lovely sentiment, but her appeals to the sisterhood ring hollow — sounding like performative feminism from someone in power who has actively undermined our reproductive rights and turned a blind eye to violence against women.  

González-Colón weaponized her alleged vulnerability by claiming that she was the target of political “bullying” because of her gender, not her record as governor. But the column centered more on responding to her critics — many from her own pro-statehood Partido Nuevo Progresista (PNP) — than on the struggles of raising two children while working the ostensibly toughest job in the archipelago.

Using the “woman card” (when a woman leverages her gender to gain an advantage) to deflect criticism is risky business. Not only does it profoundly harm real claims of gender-based discrimination, but it can also backfire because Puerto Rican women are not naive. We know what real struggle feels like. Many of us are mothers, many of us single mothers, who work a full-time job and then come home to the unpaid second job, raising our children. The only difference is that today, our main struggle is surviving González-Colón’s government.

As a young Puerto Rican single mother said when I asked her what González-Colón had done to improve the lives of women on the island: “Nada.” Nothing. And she’s right. 

In the archipelago, poverty is female. Women in Puerto Rico account for 52.8% of the population and approximately 44% of these women live in poverty, nearly four times the national poverty rate for women across the United States, according to 2023 Census data. Of that number, 21.6% live in extreme poverty, according to a report from Estudios Tecnicos. 

Let that sink in. 

And it gets worse. Data from the Youth Development Institute show that at least 126,000 mothers are heads of household across the archipelago, accounting for about 22.4% of all households. Nearly half live in poverty even though they work. These figures are not accidental. They reflect a social, economic, and political structure that keeps women vulnerable. 

Yet, González-Colón, a staunch supporter of President Donald Trump, has done little to combat these structures. She talks a good game in her speeches, extolling women’s rights and the wonders of motherhood. But the proof is in the pudding.

Since winning La Fortaleza, she has signed a ban on gender-affirming care for trans youth and pushed an anti-abortion agenda that faithfully follows the blueprint of the Trump administration, making Puerto Rico the new battleground for women’s reproductive rights. 

She recently signed Law 18-2026, amending Puerto Rico’s Penal Code to grant legal personhood to embryos and fetuses. Under this law, the nasciturus — a Latin term meaning “one who is to be born” — is now considered an individual with rights and protections starting at conception, rather than at birth. This change mimics laws passed in Alabama, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. Late last year, she signed Law 122-2025, restricting abortion access for adolescents under age 15.

Her move against women’s reproductive rights is not out of conviction. Instead, it’s a calculated political strategy at a time when she desperately needs it. Since practically her first day in office, her administration has been besieged with scandals and accusations of corruption, the latest being a drugs-for-votes scheme inside Puerto Rico’s prisons that allegedly benefited her election campaign.

As much as González-Colón protests that she is one of us and praises our resistance, the reality is that to win in 2028, she’s willing to sacrifice all of us on the altar of the anti-abortion agenda of ultra-religious voters, has failed to effectively address gender-based violence, and has embraced conservative, federal-style policies that do not favor women’s interests. 

To quote the American writer James Baldwin: “I can’t believe what you say, because I see what you do.” Therein lies the problem with González-Colón’s use of the “woman card.” Many women don’t believe her. 

A former News Director for Univision Puerto Rico and conflict correspondent, Susanne Ramírez de Arellano is a Columnist for The Latino Newsletter.

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