Hillary Clinton 2016 Campaign on Puerto Rico: Supports Municipal Bankruptcy to Help Restructure Island's Debt

Puerto Rico should be given access to U.S. bankruptcy laws to restructure some of the $72 billion of its public entities' debt, Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton said on Tuesday, Reuters reported.

"The people of Puerto Rico are hurting right now under a weak economy that has been struggling for years," the former secretary of state said.

Clinton's comments come only days after Puerto Rican Gov. Alejandro García Padilla announced that the U.S. territory may not be able to pay back its debt and instead hoped to defer payments and negotiate with creditors, according to Fox News.

"The debt is not payable," Padilla stated. "There is no other option. I would love to have an easier option. This is not politics, this is math."

Clinton, meanwhile, pointed to provisions in U.S. law that not only prevent Puerto Rico from filing for bankruptcy protection but also means that the commonwealth's public entities are not covered under Chapter 9 federal bankruptcy laws.

"As a first step, Congress should provide Puerto Rico the same authority that states already have to enable severely distressed government entities, including municipalities and public corporations, to restructure their debts under Chapter 9 of the Bankruptcy Code," the former New York senator said.

Critics of such a proposal have often characterized it as a federal bailout of Puerto Rico, a description that constitutes a "fairly abusive use of the term," Vox editorialized. Other municipalities across the U.S. already have access to Chapter 9, and the precedent would only extend to "a handful of towns in Guam."

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, a leading contender for the Republican nomination in the 2016 White House race, also expressed support for increased municipal access to bankruptcy, Bloomberg noted.

"Puerto Rico should be given the same rights as the states," Bush said in April at the Universidad Metropolitana in San Juan, the territory's capital. "In order for Puerto Rico to eventually become a state, it must begin by being treated as a state."