Puerto Crypto

This is Latino USA, the radio journal of News and Court Latin US. Latin Latino USA. I'm Maria Nojosa. We bring you stories that are underreported but that mattered to you, overlooked by the rest of the media, and while the country is struggling to deal with these, we listen to the stories of Black and Latino.

Studio United Latino Front.

A cultural renaissance organizing at the forefront of the movement. I'm Maria Ino Jossa O la Latino USA. Listener, Here's an episode from our archives. What You probably recognize this tune, but the lyrics are pretty different from Bob Marley's Stir It Up. What The participants in this late night jam session sitting poolside. There's about twenty of them, swaying and holding hands. It's spring of twenty eighteen here in drincon Puerto Rico, a town revered for its surf spots and beaches.

You can't miss him.

He's got on a wide brim black hat like zorro. It's accented with playing cards and feathers. His name is Brock Pierce, and he's sort of the main reason that these people are all here. He's very rich, though it's impossible to know just how rich. He's the leader of a movement, a movement that he says will change everything from Futuramidia and PRX. It's Latino Usa. I'm Maria Jojosa

Last year, right before tax season, a few hundred Silicon Valley types touched down in Puerto Rico.

Actually to these castaways. It's Puerto Crypto. Two weeks of bitcoin themed events and we're here at the finale Coin Agenda Caribbean.

At least five hundred cryptocurrency enthusiasts have colonized multiple floors of the lavish beachfront hotel in San Juan. The bars are buzzing, the Panama Jackats are in season, and look out, Puerto.

Rico, the disruptors are in town. And yeah, we're shaking things about.

This is Lauren, one of the people we met Millie around the conference. The first thing to know about crypto people. For them, bitcoin isn't just about money. It's a revolutionary new technology disrupting life as we know it, but in a good way.

Disrupt is one of the buzzwords you'll hear a lot at a bitcoin conference. Another one is decentralized. The best focus for me is to decentralize everything, like no mercy.

The economy since World War Two has been decentralizing.

Decentralized opps, small contrives, the new decentralized.

Internet, and at the center of this centreless world cryptocurrency.

We all have that weird cousin who is really into crypto. So we're not going to get too much into it.

All.

You've got to remember the basics.

Cryptocurrencies are kind of like virtual money that's online in theory. They can be traded for goods or services like real currencies. The first one was bitcoin. Unlike normal currencies, crypto isn't regulated by any government or central bank. It was designed to be untraceable. At first, it was used largely for buying and selling things in the dark web, mostly drugs.

Hi, my name is America and I'm Penalvi and we are the cyberquot Twins.

The cyber code twins are superstar coders from California. Like others here, they believe the cryptocurrency is the future and they don't think that the old rules regulating the economy should apply to them.

The main one is not taking the right approach to just taring off the innovative.

And so the crypto people are here in Puerto Rico looking for a way around regulations. And that's because while it's technically part of the United States, it's weird. Colonial status makes for lots of loopholes in gray areas, and the Portopians say that while they're here, they'll invest and help grow a local tech economy.

This is actually good for Puerto Rico. Cryptocurrency and black community are not moving from the Caribbean like they're going to be here.

The pro business Puerto Rican government here in twenty eighteen sees this as an opportunity and has been trying to lure crypto based businesses to the island. And here's the other reason that the crypto enthusiasts want to come to Puerto Rico. Anyone who moves to the island doesn't have to pay capital gains or federal income taxes.

Just five years before this conference. In March of twenty thirteen, you could buy bitcoin for about forty bucks.

But at its.

Highest peak, just three months before the coin agenda, bitcoin nearly hit twenty thousand dollars. That's a fifty thousand percent increase fifty thousand. If you played it right, if you had just fifty bitcoins to your name, you'd have been a millionaire.

But the crypto people haven't cast themselves as their average tax avoiding millionaires. Their pitch to Puerto Rico is that they're here to show the world what crypto can do for any economy and do it in a socially conscious way.

And that got the ear of some local entrepreneurs.

Right now, I was going to move out of Puerto Rico because I really think that politics is startable bought. Since all of these investors are moving in and all these developers are moving in, I see an opportunity to actually make this sounds ironic, make Puerto Rico right. So I need to rephrase that.

Enter Armando Gonzalez.

People know me here as AIA because a JA is simpler for most people.

When we first met AJ, we knew we'd be spending a lot of time with him. He struck us as somebody who was savvy about the whole crypto scene, a charismatic guy with a toothy grin who fit right in with the las a fair crypto atmosphere. And he's a bit of a hustler.

We have chapters all major universities in Puerto Rico, and hopefully we're going to have chapters in the nation and hopefully eventually the world.

Ready to sell you something in this case his startup, but hey, that's like what everyone here is doing, ages in his late twenties. He grew up in San Juan, Puerto Rico, a middle class kid, raised largely by his grandfather, and it took him some time to figure out what he wanted to do with the life. In college, he was all over the place, studying mechanical engineering, switched to chemistry, then in a panic psychology like this.

Whole existential crisis and analyzing what like why will my mother love me?

It's in biological Then he switches to economics after hearing about bitcoin.

To me, it was like the future.

AJ thinks about it like this, Puerto Rico's in a financial crisis, and here's this new technology that can bring investment to the island and he can be a part of it and cash in at the same time. He creates a nonprofit startup called Edge of block with the goal of going into high schools and universities to teach about blockchain. Blockchain, by the way, is the technology behind cryptocurrencies. It's extremely hard to explain, so for our purposes, don't worry about it.

It's basically interchangeable with crypto.

When we meet AJ, he's wearing a fisherman's cap that says hodl hotally.

That is awesome, hollow man.

It's an intentional misspelling of the word hold. It's nerd slang for hold on to your cryptocurrency rather than selling it. And in early twenty eighteen, if you're hotling, you're in good shape.

You know.

I actually don't hollow, but this seems like a nice thing to have too. A conversation started.

He doesn't hotal as in, AJ didn't snatch up a bunch of bitcoin and it was dirt cheap. So today he's a coin agenda trying to network and raise some money for his startup.

And so are about forty other crypto startups who are all pitching to potential investors in this main conference room.

All right, so, without further ado, we have from run to play put your hands together for Joseph.

One by one we watch these men, and it's mostly men climb up on stage. These guys paid thousands of dollars real dollars, not crypto, for the chance to pitch. Joseph himself paid more than fifteen thousand dollars to be here.

Child littlebcity is a massive issue, and one in five kids is obese. This is unacceptable and the fact that it's real is disgusting.

He's pitching a fitness app that will reward people in crypto for working out. The app, he says, will also help end world hunger.

So someday you'll be literally running to feed someone else. How far will you run to feed the world than you? Does anybody have any questions? I know, I just kind of paced in front of you and talked.

All right, you guys, But Joseph and the like are not the main attraction here at the conference. The person that AJ and others came here to see is Brock Pierce. So who is Brock Pierce?

Obviously describing this Rock Pierce who is now a billionaire, who's billionarep he wants to make Puerto Rico the center of the Earth.

You heard about him earlier at the singalongs. The guy in the Zoro had.

Midcoin Foundation chair.

Brock Pierce, the child star who grew up for now some Puerto Rico that.

Sleepee creepy cowboy from the future is named brock Pius. He began his career appearing in The Mighty Dogs.

Rock started his career as a child star in the nineties.

Then got involved with some very unsayfigures.

When he was seventeen, he helped run an online media company that got into some really sketchy territory.

Just google brock Pius scandal is all I'm saying there.

Then circa two thousand and one, he founded a company that employed Chinese sweatshop labor to collect and sell imaginary gold in World of Warcraft, the video game. This amazingly made millions of dollars.

Side note, at one point the company was run by Steve Bannon.

Yes that's Steve Bannon.

And those millions of real dollars from virtual gold. Brock put into digital money Bitcoin early on, which made him a billionaire.

At least that's what they say.

And now with the new agy crystal swathed psychotropic persona. Rocks acquired quite a cult following in the crypto community as a guru and on stage at coin Agenda.

He's at the main event, and.

As I like to point out, as Puerto Rico has got a pr problem.

The room is full.

Brock is sitting cross legged directly on the stage today.

He's draped in linen.

So many wonderful technologies all coming together at the same time, so many extraordinary innovators and entrepreneurs from all the modalities. You know, this is not a crypto or blockchain movement. This is in everything sort of movement.

And everything movement. You might be thinking this is all sounding pretty crazy, and yeah, it does to us too. But he's succeeded in selling a vision, a seductive one, a vision that technology will set us free, make us wealthy and spiritually fulfilled. And it could start right here in Puerto Rico, a place where at this time more than one hundred thousand residents are without power after the hurricane, where government, both local and federal, isn't helping people in

What do people have to lose.

Fortunately, this is an island that's need of help and that makes people more willing to listen than usual, and.

They do add big ideas for Puerto Rico, crypto based cab companies, building startup cities on unused public land, even turning the island into a cryptocurrency financial hub, a sort of Caribbean Hong Kong but for bitcoin.

One of the locals buying this vision is AJ. He wants to be a part of Brock's Everything movement. AJ sees a role for himself. He wants to get in with Brock, make some money, and bring a Puerto Rican perspective to Brock's team while he's at it.

And it's my duty to let them know that if they're going to benefit from this taxes, they should give back to the island. That I'm talking to them, I'm convincing them that they should move to Puerto Rico, connecting them with other people and they will invest in the island and we will make it better.

One of the things that crypto people keep talking about is using a new tech to fix the island's infrastructure, for example, installing smart grids and solar panels throughout the island, and as the conference is winding down, I meet some people who are telling me they're headed into the countryside to do just that. I'm told it's my chance to

We have a frickin' epic story unfolding because last night I was at this hip hop concert and I met this guy who's down to put solar panels on the roof ar cond this place for free, and it would be good to have you guys there because it just makes it look more symbolical of like something's happening. Having MPR there, it would just like make the whole story like a little bit more awesome.

So the next morning, Jonathan and I, along with four volunteers and a camera woman pile into a minivan.

We're headed to Cabra Ds on the west side of the island.

In true crypto fashion, most of them accessorize with crystals or agates of some sort. One guy has to be jeweled goateea and rocks a tailored purple vest with matching fedora and slacks.

Not exactly typical work gear for the tropics.

Were we going to have install their panels today?

I don't know, so when we come back to do the work late.

This is kind of, uh, you know, front lines media activism right now.

If you didn't catch that, he said, We're not actually going to install the solar panels today. This is going to be front lines media activism, he says, which apparently means vlogging while driving.

So, hey, you guys, real quick, I just wanted to do a quick video. We're here live and headed to the hospital that was donated.

We pull up to a huge facility.

We made it.

Yeah, we've made timing.

It used to be the town's only public health clinic until it closed down about ten years ago.

Follow us as we all get out.

And as we file out of the van, Jonathan directs us for the camera.

And stop, stop stop right there, perfect director.

Once we have the perfect take, we get a tour of the place from a member of a nonprofit one human family coalition that's coordinating relief work there.

Okay, let's start with the tour.

Since Hurricane Maria, a group of volunteers, including a search and rescue team, doctors and nurses have been using a wing of the building as a makeshift hospital, and.

There's also unused rooms on used operating rooms.

Then the tour ends and we circle up for thoughts and prayers.

Puerto Rico being one of the corners in the Bermuda triangle, almost being like a lost island, but we.

Have not forgotten about you.

We're here to support, and more than anything, we're here to raise awareness for ourselves and for the world through sharing these videos, through sharing this media.

That's why we're here.

We're here for them, the people who have lost their homes, the people who have lost their families, We're here for them. We're here AH one, two three.

And that was it.

Then we piled into the van and left. No work of any kind was done. Side note. Over a year later, the cap of the s clinic still doesn't have the solar panels or even an X ray machine. None of the crypto voluntearists from our trip of them back there, and the building is currently closed. The video shoot felt more like a low key pr campaign than an actual aid mission.

It was clearly a networking opportunity.

Maybe not the best example of Brocks Everything movement in action. We thought, okay, maybe it was just a fluke, but it turned out to be just a taste of what was coming.

Coming up on Latino US say hey, there's.

A representative of me. This is a decentralized moment.

Is I'm not aware of anyone building any gated community.

I think you ald.

The island and the rest of the world react to the portopians, stay with us, don't stay by. Yes, hey, we're back. And before the break, our reporters, Joaquin Cottler and Michael O'Brien took you into the world of cryptocurrency. True believers set on making Puerto Rico their new home. But in the wake of Hurricane Maria, a bunch of rich Americans moving down and talking about changing everything on

They are attracted to Puerto Rico because it holds out the promise that they can convert their cryptocurrencies into harder currencies while paying no taxes whatsoever.

That was March of twenty eighteen. A few months later, anti austerity protests took place around the island.

Thousands marked May Day by joining a general strike in the capital of San Juan to protest austerity measures, and so.

In that context, the Pertopians were coming off as pretty tone deaf. Back now to Juaquin and Michael.

The May Day protests, they aren't really AJ's thing. He's gone all in with Brock Pierces Everything movement. It's a few months after the conference and Brock is spearheading another week of crypto events, this time on the west coast of the island instead of in the capital. They're calling it Restart West. When we first met Aj at the crypto conference, he was dead set on getting in with Brock and his inner circle, and when he'd heard about this trip out west, he saw his chance.

So he just showed up at Brock's house the.

Day before they were going to leave. I just went there and I didn't leave. I was down to sleep in front of the door. That wasn't needed in order for me to go with them.

And it worked.

They brought him along to act as a liaison between the crypto people and the locals.

Because it's important to have someone from here help with the cultural and language barrier.

After all the bad press after the last events, the goal was to make this one appear more inclusive. They wanted to develop a better relationship with Puerto Ricans. Aj would be their super.

Weapon, and that's why it's important to be working with locals if you want to make an impact on the island.

Of the locals, and as Aj tells it, his local knowledge came in handy. For example, they were having trouble getting a venue. Aj stepped in. He made some calls, pulled some strings in one fifty thousand dollars donation to the university. Later, Restart West was in business.

Restart West is a more intimate affair, at least compared with last March's events, more of a retreat than a conference, lots of brainstorming sessions about how to be of service to the island.

Puerto Rico has the possibility now of being put on the map.

There's a hub of innovation and that's a wonderful thing if it works.

Overall, think less pitching, more guided meditation, shand hum.

I am peace, I have silence inside of me.

They shack up in a ritzy villa in the hills overlooking the water and rincone. One of the first evenings goes so well and impromptu singalong breaks out, the same one you heard earlier.

At first, things go pretty smoothly.

AJ organized as a hackathon at the university that's a success.

Two days later is their big outreach event, the Day of Listening. It's built as an opportunity for the crypto people to listen and learn from Puerto Ricans.

No I actually wanted to be more involved in the planning of that particular event.

AJ says that if he had been, the flyers wouldn't have all been in English.

For one, because the event takes place in a conference frame at a resort spruced out with fake columns in these wrenched chandeliers.

Frock's wearing a shirt that says Banksy is female.

Rock led the charge you guys have been working your butt off for years down here.

That helps hear Now.

It's basically just the crypto people themselves in the room, mostly non Puerto Ricans, except for a group of protesters that showed up. There were half a dozen of them in the room. They started by voicing their concerns.

I can't even afford to buy the land I'm stepping on.

All you see is extraction. I don't agree with this project.

And it quickly becomes apparent that this day of listening, it doesn't have a lot of listening on the agenda.

More telling, Really, it is.

Going to be a beautiful thing. All of these people.

Have such good intentions, but you don't know that yet.

Ed, I'm not a believe.

And they're going to make something beautiful happen, and you're going to be a part of it, whether you like it or.

Not, whether I like it or not, it's going to rock steps up and takes the mic me.

This is a decentralized movement.

If someone wants to build a gated community, I mean, they can't do what they want to do.

I guess just the activists accuse them of cryptocolonialism under the guise of helping Puerto Rico recover from Hurricane Maria.

Things escalate quickly.

Planet have any interest in Puerto Rico until the taxpace came, and that's why you're here.

I am here in service.

I've committed my entire life to the last breath, in service to humanity.

I go where I can make a difference. I do not give a about money.

It is not about compounding interest, it's not compounding impact.

Where can you make a difference? And so at the choint is that world going. I like water and I like more places. So there's a lot of places in the world that need help.

And great.

A few moments later, they're somehow arguing about agriculture now and Brock comes out with a strange retort, awesome.

And that's wonderful. To eat the rainbow? Are you saying to eat the rainbow?

Yes, the colors, the food groups, natural agriculture, organic food, biodynamic.

It's great stuff.

The look on the protesters face is one of shock mixed with controlled rage. The day of listening has officially gone off the rails.

I think I just offered to get a farm, and if you were so interested in doing this, I just offered to support.

You and give you as munch help because I can't.

I don't think that. I think that.

I think that's point of year.

Somehow the day wrapped up without anyone getting punched in the face and everythings cooled down.

Brock said this in an interview.

We had a very healthy conversation with you know, a few local Puerto Ricans that don't yet understand what this movement or technology is about. For five hundred years, this place is you know, been taken advantage of. So I mean that I think that that's where.

Puerto Ricans should start. They should start skeptical.

Videos of the argument quickly surfaced on social media, the press picked it up, it went semi viral.

Suddenly the die of listening becomes a die of project.

And that's a perfect example of why you need someone from here involved in an event that is called day of listening, because if you want to listen to the Puerto Ricans, well you start by listening to the Puerto Rican I want to help you.

Aj says that if they had listened to him, they would have had more portagins in the room that were open to their ideas. He would have anticipated the protesters, maybe figured out a way to stop them from disrupting, do some damage control.

And just like one redly Gold, person could come in and just make a gigantic scene about her own individual ideas and people would think that she is to presenting the rest of us, when that is not true. She's just an individual.

The whole episode left kind of a stink on the crypto movement in Puerto Rico. For a lot of the locals, the Portopians seemed to be just another example in a long history of people coming to the island to make a quick, text free bug, and the timing just couldn't have been worse. At the same time the Puerto Ricans are dealing with so much. After Restart West, there wasn't a whole lot in the press about the Portopians, but just a few months later, Bitcoin was all over the news again.

In twenty eighteen, bitcoin lost about eighty percent of its value relative to the dollar. We're not just talking about Bitcoin here, Other big cryptocurrencies lost the lion's share of their value.

True disaster struck the crypto World's.

Been a wild ride for Bitcoin this month and this year, the cryptocurrency going from the highs near twenty thousand dollars to the lows and near three thousand dollars.

Crypto bottoms out. Billions in virtual coin just gone.

I come to bury Bitcoin, not to praise it.

Sent to the Great Microsoft Windows recycling bin in the sky. Those thousands of prospective Portopians, well, most of them just bailed, but the true believers forged ahead, including Aj.

They are buying out the islands, little Buck.

I'm riding in the cab with AJ and his then girlfriend, Scarlett, who also works for his company, Edgie Block a lot of it.

We met up with him.

Again in March of twenty nineteen, a full year after we first met him. They're going to give me a tour of Portopia itself, the crypto enclave in old San Juan, where Brock and his cohort are snatching up and repurposing historic property.

Yeah, they literally must have just unloaded their career ships.

Brock and his followers have set up shops right in the heart of the Spanish colonial.

City, almost the Monastery Rock Fierce, his home on the island.

The monastery is a beautiful old Masonic lodge. It's painted a bright pastel orange and sits in a row of other majestic, similar looking buildings. AJ used to spend quite a lot of time here, but he hasn't been inside for months.

We're going to gatus issues with some people that are security.

As we walk around. I noticed something's different about aj. He's less cocky, pensive, a little distracted. The rest of the buildings he shows me are within a few blocks of the monastery. There's a co working space, but it's mostly empty. There's a weird cafe and a big vacant building that once housed the children's museum.

So Uerte Rico close, a lot of schools, a lot of hospitals, and a lot of like landmarks. In one of these places was the Shoulders Museum.

In tourists thronged Old San Juan. This was a place that locals brought their kids. It had been shudded for two years.

When brought announced that he was going to buy it.

Crypto people used it as sort of a meeting and co working space for a bit, but the community resented outsiders taking what used to be a cultural building and turning it into a private space for techis. The mayor of San Juan even got involved. There was some drama, a Twitter fight. Supposedly there are plans for a new museum going forward, but for now, the big empty building just sits there.

After a while, nothing's happening with it, and I don't think no one any has ties no longer, so I really don't.

Know what It serves as a reminder of the tension between the crypto folks and the community. I tried to get the details from AJ about exactly why it's been sitting vacant for so long, but he doesn't seem to really know what happened, and it seems to hit a nerve when I press him on it, like, wouldn't you be among the people who knew what happened to that building if you were like part.

Of that Yes, well, yes, but no, because we.

Basically Armando likes to express his opinion, and his opinion is not welcome.

Yeah, Scarlett is trying to be diplomatic. I'm she takes Aj aside and urges him to stay cool, but he clearly wants to get some stuff off his chest.

No, we need to talk about this first.

He admits that while he was once a trusted member of Brock's inner circle, not so much anymore.

He's significantly older than the other Puerto Ricans that they work with, and he's very passionate and outspoken.

He's harder to work with.

Sometimes my passion can seem like a threat to some of them.

I guess.

AG says they treated him well when he was useful, but when he spoke his mind about things like how they screwed up the day of Listening, he fell out of favor. Not with Brock directly, he says, but with the new inner circle.

Yeah, the things that broke. Sometimes he's not here and then there's this a group of people that forms under him that they just are looking up for themselves.

There's no hierarchy and everything she centralized.

It's a doggy dog situation where people are fighting over power. And like frequently when we were part of the those A's songs like.

The Lord of the Flies, new people showed up in the scene that AJ didn't get along with. He started feuding with everyone. Rumors start flying around, and AJ developed a reputation as a bit of a loose cannon.

I just became like this volatile, crazy, intense Puerto Rican kid that we shouldn't trust, even though he's doing everything for them.

So AG gets pushed aside, and according to him, they lose someone who could have helped them look better in the eyes of Puerto Ricans.

My biggest criticism is that I don't want the whole thing to look like a pubilicity scheme, because if it looks like a publicity scheme, people are not gonna take them seriously. And if they don't take them seriously, we can have impact.

Scarlet's worried he'll say too much and get them in trouble. After all, they're still trying to get funding for their startup. She tries to stop him, but he finally goes off.

What is the point?

What is the point of this? That they're filled with both people and it's.

For all the time that we've known Aj, he's always appeared to believe one hundred percent in the Portopians and their whole vision for the island, and this is the first time that we see that his feelings are maybe more complicated than that. In the year since we met Aj, it's pretty clear that the cryptocurrency paradise that Frock prophesied hasn't exactly come to pass.

But is it all bs?

We went back to Coin and Jena, Caribbean this year, twenty nineteen, after Bitcoin's value crashed.

It's a completely different scene.

Last time was a multi floored multimedia affair. This year, it feels like the entire conference could fit in an elementary School, Capeia. As soon as I walked in, I was greeted by someone selling crypto artwork.

So this is crypto art, okay, so think of it as bitcoin or in physical form as artwork.

It's kind of steampunky, a little magic to gather.

There's these top hats, tribal tattoos, basically what you'd expect.

Were you here when you hear last year? I was not, so I understand it was much bigger. I will thank you for your time, Thank you very much.

Counting the art dealer, there's just half a dozen booths in the lobby. Brock isn't even here. But I did find one person worth talking to, Michael Turpin. He's the man in charge of coin agenda. We went to him wondering why didn't anyone see this, this crypto crash, Why didn't anyone see this coming?

Why do people not recognize when they're in the middle of the bubble because they're high, they're on the drug of the bubble.

That's not necessarily his opinion, It's something that Turpin heard someone say earlier at the event. But Michael Turpin is one of the most influential people in crypto. He throws these coin agendas, these crypto conferences all over the world.

But we'll be back next year, and he says bitcoin will rise again.

I expect that the price of bitcoin will probably be about double. Not financial advice, but I've been projecting. I projected in twenty fourteen.

At the price of bitcoin, and Michael Turbin was right after we talked to him. The price of crypto shot back up again. But will it mean anything for Puerto Rico. Ever since Puerto Rico became a colonial possession of the United States, mainlanders have shown up to make their fortunes

It wouldn't be accurate to say that the Portopians Everything movement has contributed absolutely nothing to Puerto Rico. In twenty eighteen, Coin Agendas organizers say they gave twenty five thousand dollars to local charities. Rock Pierson himself has made a few public donations that we were able to track down about seventy thousand dollars worth in total. For context, that's less than he donated to Trump's reelection campaign and to the

And as we're creating jobs. According to recent government data, for each of the twenty two hundred people who moved to the island to avoid taxes since twenty fifteen, just about two jobs were created. But AJ thinks that by promoting Puerto Rico as a crypto and tech hub, more jobs and investment will come. Despite all the missteps, the colonial posturing, the grandiose promises to change everything. He's still betting on Brock and the Portopians.

My grandfather, for example, is constantly like reminding me that all the Americans have done, this goes over. I don't know if I should say that, but then I keep telling him no, I mean, this is an opportunity.

I mean it's an opportunity for himself and for Puerto Rico.

As I'm saying, I'm also convincing myself because I have some hope in humanity and I really think that if the right people online, they can really make a difference. And I know it's really swimming against the current. I can make a difference on this island that I'm going to be able to see on my own lifetime.

He still believes, even though some days it's hard for Agent and keep the Faith.

This episode was produced by Michael O'Brien and Juaquine Cottler. It was edited by Marlon Bishop, who is mixed b Dephnely Leveau. Fact checking this week by Amy Tardif. Special thanks to Andrew Mergalvovasquez and Nico Rouge. The Latino USA team includes Andrea Lopes, Russado, Marta Martinez, Mike Sargent, Victoria Strada and Prinaldo Leanos Junior, with help from Dori mar Marquez. Our senior engineer is Julia Caruso, Additional engineering support by

Latino USA is made possible in part by the Heising Simons Foundation, unlocking knowledge, opportunity and possibilities more at hsfoundation dot org, The Ford Foundation, working with visionaries on the front lines of social change worldwide, and the John D and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation,