In a conversation I had with Sen. Will Parkinson over the airwaves on ThePOINT with Ray Gibson, Parkinson declared he would not introduce a Bill to correct the legal problems in the Legislation that created the Commission on Decolonization (COD), but he will introduce a Bill asking people to vote whether they want to do something as serious as changing political status without doing any public education beyond spend $30,000 for educational materials that no one has seen.
My point in all my conversation with senators and Melvin Won-Pat Borja has been focused on the very serious problems with the COD legislation that need to be corrected are 1) Reinstate STATUS QUO Option and Task Force, and 2) remove the restrictions on who can vote for political status change. Until those changes are made, any efforts to change Guam’s political status will fail.
If the legislature doesn’t correct the flaws in the legislation, there will never be any political status change. The COD’s refusal to allow the creation of a Status Quo Task Force to take part in the public education process sets the entire political change process up for failure at the only level that matters: Before the U.S. Congress.
Several times Congress has denied Puerto Rico’s petitions for political status change based on the lack of a “Status Quo” option during public education and voting. And Parkinson’s and Melvin Won-Pat Borja’s declaration that STATUS QUO is not change, is not a good defense legally and publicly. Eliminating discussions on STATUS QUO from the public education process implies voters have three options for political status: Statehood, Independence, or Free Association.
The second problem is restricting the vote to the decedents of indigenous Chamorro people. That was knocked down by the Davis Decision, and if we haven’t changed political status (with the approval of Congress) we are under U.S. Laws.
I have as strong a claim to Chamorro ancestry as my grandmother, who died on the Manenggon March, was pure indigenous Chamorro, her generation went through a “political change process” when the Treaty of Paris was signed in 1899. The colonizer and ruling political entity at the time, Spain, transferred all its assets and records to the new political entity, the United States. After the treaty was signed, both Cuba and the Philippines started and completed the process, outlined in the treaty, and became Independent Nations. Guam has spent 75 years trying (and failing) to change its political status without following the process.
With his public declaration to do “absolutely nothing” to correct the problems with the COD enabling legislation, why is he even holding the town halls? The only reason that makes sense to me is he is beginning his 2026 campaign by making a lot of noise while doing nothing to advance any change to political status.
Parkinson’s stated plan to put a question on the 2026 primary election asking voters: “Do you want to change political status? Yes or No” is meaningless. The primary election has the lowest voter turnout and any numbers generated at the primary will not represent the will of the people, making any actions coming out of the primary meaningless.
Though Sen. Parkinson claims to be advancing the cause by his “political status change” town hall meetings, all he is doing is generating free media coverage as we head full steam into the 2026 political campaign season, without doing anything to fix the problems with the political change process to make it possible to actually change our political process.
The only thing that can happen under existing law will be to continue to provide six figure salaries, benefits and retirement benefits to politically well-connected insiders for doing absolutely nothing that benefits any of the people of Guam as proven by the COD’s 45 years of failure changing our political status.
Until COD’s enabling legislation is corrected, and a “Status Quo” Task Force has equal access to the education process and funding as the other task forces, and voting is open to all registered voters in Guam, political status change will continue to be “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
Ken Leon-Gerrero is a resident of Santa Rita Sumai.
