Jenniffer González


Jenniffer Aydin González Colón is a Puerto Rican politician and the current and 20th resident commissioner of Puerto Rico. González has served in leadership positions in the New Progressive Party of Puerto Rico and in the Republican Party of the United States. These positions included being the chairwoman of the Puerto Rico Republican Party, Speaker and minority leader of the House of Representatives of Puerto Rico, and vice-chair of the PNP.
González is the youngest person to be Resident Commissioner and the first woman to occupy the role.

Early life and education

González was born in San Juan to Jorge González and Nydia Colón, both lifelong public servants. She graduated from and then studied her bachelor's degree in Political Science at the University of Puerto Rico. During these years she served as the executive director of the Young Republican Federation of Puerto Rico.
Although she obtained both a juris doctor and an LL.M. from the Interamerican University of Puerto Rico School of Law she has yet to be admitted to the Bar of any jurisdiction.

Career

Representative

González was first elected to the House of Representatives in a special election held on February 24, 2002, to fill the vacancy left by former House Speaker Edison Misla Aldarondo, after his resignation as Representative from San Juan's 4th District. She was the first female elected representative of San Juan's Fourth District, the youngest member of the 14th Legislative Assembly, and the youngest woman ever to be elected to the Puerto Rico Legislative Assembly. Before being elected as Representative, González served as Chairwoman of the San Juan New Progressive Party Youth Organization and was very active in the Pro-Statehood Students movement while attending college.
González was re-elected in the 2004 Puerto Rico general elections, this time as an At-Large Representative. She served as Chairwoman of the House Government Affairs Committee, and as ranking member of the Budget, San Juan Development, Women's Affairs, and Internal Affairs Committees, as well as the Joint Commission for the Revision of the Civil Code of Puerto Rico.

Speaker of the House

González was re-elected for another term at the 2008 Puerto Rico general elections obtaining the most votes from her party, and the second most votes overall. At the age of 32, she was elected House Speaker by members of her New Party for Progress delegation during a caucus held on November 7, 2008. González defeated incumbent House Speaker José Aponte Hernández in his bid for re-election to that post, becoming the youngest person in Puerto Rican history to be elected Speaker of the House, and the third woman to hold that seat.

Chairwoman of the Republican Party of Puerto Rico

In November 2015, González was unanimously elected as Chairwoman of the Republican Party of Puerto Rico after being the party's Vice-Chair for eight years. She succeeded Aguadilla mayor Carlos Méndez in the position that once was held by former Governor Don Luis A. Ferré, founder of the New Progressive Party and Dr. Jose Celso Barbosa the founder of both the Republican Party and the statehood movement in Puerto Rico.

House minority leader

In 2012, González was again re-elected this time gathering the most votes overall, despite the fact that her party lost the majority of seats. The same night of the election, she was selected as Minority Leader of her party.

Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico

On September 14, 2015, González announced her candidacy to succeed Pedro Pierluisi as Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico. Six days later, one of Pierluisi's rivals for the gubernatorial nomination, Ricardo Rosselló, chose her as his running mate for June 5, 2016, primary and the November 8, 2016, general election. During the ten months the primary race lasted, various public opinion polls consistently showed González to have over 70% approval ratings of the electorate, making her the most popular politician of any political party on the Island.
On June 5, 2016 González won the NPP primary by a landslide margin of 70.54% of the vote over her opponent Carlos Pesquera. She thus became the first woman in the history of the New Progressive Party to be nominated to the Resident Commissioner seat in Congress for the November general election.
On November 8, 2016, González was elected Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico, with 48.77% of the vote, over her main opponent Hector Ferrer of the Popular Democratic Party of Puerto Rico, thus becoming the first woman and youngest person to represent Puerto Rico in the U.S. Congress since the creation of the Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico seat 116 years prior in 1900.
So far in her time in Congress, González has focused on sponsoring or cosponsoring bills related to veteran affairs, health relief and tax relief for Puerto Rico. Congresswoman González is a member of the Republican Conference House Policy Committee. She is also a member of the House Committees on Natural Resources, Veterans’ Affairs, and Small Business, Vice Chairman of the Subcommittee on Indian, Insular, and Alaska Native Affairs, member of Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations and Co-Chair of Congressional Friends of Spain Caucus
For the 116th Congress, González is assigned to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and the Committee on Natural Resources

Committee assignments

González is a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership, the House Baltic Caucus, the Congressional Western Caucus, and the Climate Solutions Caucus. She co-chairs the Congressional HIV/AIDS Caucus with Barbara Lee.

Political views

In The Hills article The Hill's Latina Leaders to Watch, Resident Commissioner González is described as a pro-statehood, small government, pro-business conservative. In the first session of the 115th United States Congress, González was ranked the 19th most bipartisan member of the House by the Bipartisan Index, a metric published by The Lugar Center and Georgetown's McCourt School of Public Policy to assess congressional bipartisanship.
In 2019, González was one of three House Republicans, along with Brian Fitzpatrick and John Katko, to co-sponsor the Equality Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Although González could not vote for final passage of the bill due to U.S. House rules, the legislation passed the United States House of Representatives during the 116th Congress.