Puerto Rico Resident Commissioner in Congress

Current Representative

What the Resident Commissioner Can and Cannot Do

Pablo José Hernández holds nearly every legislative power a House member has. He introduces bills and amendments, serves on standing committees, votes in those committees, questions witnesses, and speaks and manages debate on the House floor. Rule III of the House rules gives the Resident Commissioner and the delegates the same powers and privileges as members inside the Committee of the Whole and on the committees where they serve.

The limit is final passage. Hernández cannot vote when the full House decides whether a bill becomes law, and he cannot vote for Speaker. The Committee of the Whole vote has been turned on and off as House majorities changed, and it was restored at the start of the 116th Congress in 2019. It comes with a safeguard: if the votes of the delegates and the Resident Commissioner decide a recorded vote in the Committee of the Whole, the committee rises and the House votes again without them.

Committee votes still count in full, which is where the office does most of its work. Puerto Rico has a particular stake in that, because federal law reaches the island in areas that range from Medicaid funding formulas to disaster recovery money, and much of that is written in committee before it ever reaches the floor.

A Four Year Term, Unlike Every Other Seat

The Resident Commissioner is the only member of Congress elected to a four year term. Everyone else in the House serves two years. The seat is elected alongside Puerto Rico general elections rather than on the two year federal cycle, so Hernández, elected in November 2024 and sworn in on January 3, 2025, next faces voters in 2028. The Office of the Historian of the House attributes the change from a two year to a four year term to the Jones Act of 1917. Hernández’s own office cites Public Law 81-600 of 1950 as establishing the current four year term.

Committee Assignments

In the 119th Congress Hernández serves on the Committee on Homeland Security, on its Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence and its Subcommittee on Emergency Management and Technology. He is the first Resident Commissioner to sit on that committee. He also serves on the Committee on Natural Resources, on the Subcommittee on Indian and Insular Affairs and the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, the panels that handle most territorial policy.

How Long Puerto Rico Has Sent a Resident Commissioner

The office dates to the Foraker Act of 1900, which set up a civil government for the island after the Spanish-American War. Federico Degetau became the first Resident Commissioner in the 57th Congress, which convened in 1901, and at that point the job carried no right to speak on the House floor. The Jones Act of 1917 extended those rights. Hernández is the first person from the Popular Democratic Party to hold the seat in twenty years.

Population and Representation

The Census Bureau estimated Puerto Rico’s population at 3,184,835 as of July 1, 2025, down about 3 percent from the 2020 count of 3,285,874. Puerto Rico has more residents than 20 states. Each of those states elects two senators and at least one voting representative. Residents of the island are U.S. citizens, and those living in Puerto Rico cannot vote in presidential general elections and have no voting member in either chamber of Congress.

How the Resident Commissioner Is Elected

Voters across the whole island elect the Resident Commissioner in a single at-large contest at each Puerto Rico general election. The term begins on January 3 following the election. Because the term runs four years, the seat is not on the ballot in November 2026.

What is on the ballot nationally on November 3, 2026

Contact Your Representative

Sources

Officeholder, committee assignments, and office addresses come from the Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives and from the Resident Commissioner’s official House website. The powers and limits of the office come from the Rules of the House of Representatives for the 119th Congress, Rule III. Population figures are U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2025 estimates. The history of the office comes from the Foraker Act of 1900 and the Office of the Historian of the House. Checked August 12, 2026.