SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – In Puerto Rico’s hurricane-ravaged capital, Carmen Yulin Cruz is everywhere you go these days: handing out bags of ice, wading through chest-deep floodwaters, hugging people in need of comfort.
Cruz has long won attention across the island for her hands-on style of leadership in San Juan. But this week she rose to international prominence as a target of Twitter attacks by U.S. President Donald Trump – including one tweet Sunday calling her and others “politically motivated ingrates.”
The insult came hours after Saturday Night Live portrayed Cruz in a skit highlighting the latest controversy for the 54-year-old former human resources executive, who occupies one of Puerto Rico’s most powerful posts and has become something of a divisive figure on the island of 3.4 million residents.
In a U.S. territory whose relationship with the mainland is usually the single most prominent political issue, Cruz backs independence but is a member of the party that supports maintaining the territorial status quo. A graduate of Boston University and Carnegie Mellon, she is also a former member of the island’s House of Representatives.
She first grabbed headlines in 2012 when she ran against San Juan’s three-term incumbent mayor, cobbling together a campaign committee in just three days when her party’s original candidate dropped out. Despite being a virtual unknown for many, she cruised to a surprising win by securing the support of a coalition of left-leaning interests from the LGBTQ community to university students to financially powerful unions.