VIDEO: NPP launches statehood ad

The Spanish-language ad features Gov. Luis Fortuño noting that Puerto Rican statehood would mean that new 51-star U.S. flags would fly at every state government installation and U.S. embassy around the world.

The Puerto Rico flag, meanwhile, would remain the same as it continues to “fly on the four winds,” the statehood New Progressive Party president says in the one-minute spot.

It is the flag of the “most powerful nation on Earth” that would have to be changed to make room for the “Puerto Rican star” when the island “ceases to be a colony.”

It includes images of national flags outside the United Nations in New York City and the U.S. embassy in Paris.

The November 6 election will include votes for governor, resident commissioner, the island Senate and House, and 78 city hall mayoral races. Voters in Puerto Rico will also vote on the status issue that day.

The plebiscite ballot will consist of two questions. Voters will first be asked whether they want the current territory status to continue. Regardless of how voters answer that question, they will then be asked to express their preference among the three alternatives to the current status: statehood, independence and nationhood in free association with the United States.

Puerto Ricans previously have voted to remain a commonwealth in referendums issued in 1967 (60 percent) and 1993 (48 percent). In a 1998 plebiscite, the “none of the above” option won with 50 percent of the vote, followed by statehood at 46 percent. The “none of the above” option was added by the commonwealth supporting Popular Democratic Party to protest the definition of “commonwealth” on the ballot.