A/HRC/49/46/Add.1 61. As federal laws supersede local laws of Guam and other territories, the local population often feels its rights and interests are subsidiary to those of citizens from the mainland. Citizens of Guam cannot vote in presidential elections and have no voting representation in the United States Congress. A plebiscite to let the people who were colonized by the United States and their descendants decide on their status and the future of the island was blocked by a lower court and affirmed in a ruling of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in 2019. The Ninth Circuit found the plebiscite statute used ancestry as a proxy for race, in violation of the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution. Many local residents feel they are second-class citizens who cannot effectively present and protect their interests. 62. The Commonwealth of Puerto Rico is similarly devoid of equal rights to political participation and representation. Puerto Rico has a fiscal deficit that compounds its political rights deficit. Because of the territory’s precarious budgetary position, real legal and political authority ultimately resides in the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico, which was imposed by Congress as part of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act of 2016. The draconian austerity measures imposed on Puerto Rican territorial authorities and the whole population, without regard to any obvious human rights considerations in the decisions made by the Board, have led to dramatic cuts and reductions in areas such as public education and public health. It is difficult to disagree with the claims made by many Puerto Ricans during meetings in San Juan and Vieques, that Puerto Rico is being controlled by a colonial-type overseas power to the detriment of its people, without any meaningful representation at the national level and with no real ability to govern itself as a Non-Self-Governing Territory in the international sense. 63. While the current administration must be commended for adopting executive orders that seek to address some of these grievances, none fundamentally change many of the claims of discriminatory treatment. An anachronistic legal and political legacy from an era with a colonial mindset towards mainly non-white minorities remains in place. The Special Rapporteur is of the view that a new federal approach is necessary in order to fully respect the identity, traditions and specificities of the populations of the territories and their minority communities, including their rights as Non-Self-Governing Territories and their human rights as recognized under international human rights instruments. X. Environmental injustice and discriminatory treatment of minorities 64. Minorities are often disproportionally exposed to serious environmental hazards and contamination, including contamination of their sources of drinking water. The disproportionate impact of such hazards on society, including on health, standards of living and educational performance, were highlighted during powerful testimonies in Guam and Vieques, Puerto Rico. Other special procedures, including the Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent, have also been presented with compelling evidence of minorities “in disadvantaged areas with hazardous environments (for example, in proximity to industrial toxicity, power stations, flood zones and so on) and without access to social and commercial facilities. The most polluting industrial facilities, across a range of sectors from farming and mining to manufacturing, are more likely to be situated in poor and minority neighbourhoods, including those of people of African descent … and the lead-contaminated water in Flint, Michigan”.23 Minority communities and the peoples in territories such as Guam and Puerto Rico, as well as poorer minority rural regions on the mainland, may find themselves disproportionally exposed to contamination by chemicals or other pollutants, underserved by municipal sewage systems or used over years as dumping grounds for military toxic ammunition and poisons. Despite the grave health consequences, highly contaminated sites known as Superfund sites such as in Vieques, Puerto Rico, and in Guam, or the municipal water supply in Flint, Michigan, where minorities are concentrated, do not seem to be as sufficiently prioritized for clean-up as they should be, in an efficient or expedited manner. 23 A/HRC/33/61/Add.2, para, 52. 15