Campaign Hit

Puerto Ricans strike two cities

Politics by terrorism is not confined to Tehran or Bogota. Last week, just one day before Puerto Rico's Democratic primary and three days before Illinois's general primary, two armed bands claiming to belong to the Puerto Rican nationalist F.A.L.N. attacked Carter-Mondale campaign headquarters in Chicago and George Bush's office in New York City, seizing hostages in both places. The F.A.L.N. (for Fuerzas Armadas de Liberation National) has claimed responsibility for more than 100 bombings in major U.S. cities in the past six years and obviously wants to make Puerto Rico's future an issue in the 1980 elections. The terrorists' demand: outright independence.

The two attacks occurred nearly simultaneously at about 9 a.m. Saturday and lasted only 20 minutes apiece. No one was injured, and the workers were able to free themselves within an hour. In the Chicago assault, some half-a-dozen terrorists, with white knit scarves around their heads, entered the Carter office in the downtown Loop. Armed with rifles and pistols, they ordered the seven campaign workers, in English: "Cooperate and lie down, and you won't get hurt." The terrorists tied up the workers with clothesline and taped their mouths. One hostage thought that one of the intruders had been a former Carter volunteer. The assailants ransacked desks and file cabinets, but it is not known whether they found what they were looking for.

Before leaving, they hung several long banners and spray-painted the office with slogans: FREE PUERTO RICO and STATEHOOD MEANS DEATH, as well as the initials F.A.L.N.

At Bush's New York headquarters, five workers were waiting for someone with a key to let them into the office when four F.A.L.N. members, wearing blue-and-white-checked pillowcases as masks, stepped off the elevator. Brandishing handguns, they tied the workers' hands behind their backs and ordered them to lie face down on the floor. One hitch: everyone was still locked out. Five more people got off the elevator, one of whom had the key. Once inside, the intruders went to work looking for voter-registration and phone lists. They left emptyhanded, however, since the address lists were at a mailing house and the phone lists were scattered around the office. Before going, they sprayed the walls with paint, as the terrorists had in Chicago.

Although the 3.3 million Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens, the island is a self-governing commonwealth, not a state, and its residents have no vote in presidential elections. This year, however, they are holding their first presidential primaries and will, as usual, send delegates to the conventions. George Bush who won the Republican primary a month ago, supports statehood for the island, as do all the other Republican candidates. Neither Carter nor Kennedy has outlined his position, although pro-Carter Puerto Ricans generally favor statehood while Kennedy supporters want improvements in the island's current status. In any case, the F.A.L.N. and its tactics seem to have little support in Puerto Rico. Voting during the past few years indicates that almost half of the island's citizens favor statehood, about 45% want to remain a commonwealth--and fewer than 7% support independence.

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