Americas 51st and 52nd States?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

The anti-Castroites are deluding themselves if they think they will be quickly gaining power in Cuba after the Castroes are gone.

51st State could be the State of Mariana (Guam plus Northern Marianas) or the State of Puerto Rico.  Mariana is a bit small at only 250K in population, but has the political will to become a U.S. State should the situation allow.  Puerto Rico could become a State now but its support for Statehood is unlikely to creep past the ~45% level it has been at for the past few decades.  Both the USVI and AS are too small and if AS tried to grow by reuniting with Samoa, it would be to gain independence, not Statehood.

There is no external territory at this time that has both the desire to become a State and any chance of being admitted as one.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

I would guess Puerto Rico and DC as the next two states most likely to join.  DC was actually very close to becoming a state in the 70's and I think that with Democrats now controlling Congress and a majority of state legislatures it could happen in the near future.  It appears as though the 110th will at least be giving DC a real representative instead of a non-voting delegate.  Many top Democrats have said that a proposed bill to give DC a vote and Utah a new vote will be a high priority for the 110th Congress since it appears unlikely that the 109th will get to it this year.

Why Utah? Isn't it Montana that gets the next new seat?

Nope, under the formula used to apportion Representatives, the 436th seat goes to Utah, Montana doesn't get a second seat under the 2000 Census until the 441st seat is handed out.  The next available seat goes not to the state that has the highest average population per district (in which case Montana would already have 2 seats) but the state which has the highest value under the method known as the method of equal proportions

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

I tried some other apportionment methods just to see the result.  If as the divisor used to generate priority values, instead of using the geometric mean of n and n+1 (where n is the number of seats the State has already) one uses the arithmetic mean, you get the same results in 2000 for the 435 seats, but the 436th would go to New York instead of Utah.  If you use simply n as Verily was suggesting, you get a result that is much more favorable to small states.

Differences would be:
California 50 (-3)
Connecticut 6 (+1)
Delaware 2 (+1)
Florida 24 (-1)
Mississippi 5 (+1)
Montana 2 (+1)
New York 28 (-1)
North Carolina 12 (-1)
Ohio 17 (-1)
Oklahoma 6 (+1)
Oregon 6 (+1)
South Dakota 2 (+1)
Texas 31 (-1)
Utah 4 (+1)

[Net gain for Bush of 2 EV in 2004]

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

For all the ppl that are saying DC and Puerto Rico I say never

Usually when states enter (HI and AK) one is conservative and one is liberal, they wouldn't enter one state that would vote 85+ Dem and one that vote 60+ Dem at the same time, if its DC expect Guam or at least something conservative.

typical conservative BS there, putting petty politics ahead of the good of the people...

And also quite untrue.  Dakota was split up into two states instead of entering as one so as to give the Republicans two additional safe Senators and EV's.  Oklahoma and Sequoyah were forced to enter as one state and not two.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Thats funny.  Last time I checked the parties that are pro-statehood in PR are lossely affiliated with the Republicans and those that are against statehood are affiliated HEAVILY with liberal Democrats.  Therefore if PR were to become a state it would only happen if the Democrats were in a position of weakness.  SO tell me, how does that translate to a Democratic majority after statehood?

The current party setup is organized according to whether the party favors statehood (PNP), continuing as a commonwealth (PPD) or, independence (PIP) with PNP and PPD being the two major parties.  Obviously once Puerto Rico becomes a State, they will need new organizing principles.  The PPD as you noted is strongly aligned with the Democrats and their Resident Commissioners have always caucused with Democrats in the U.S. House.  By contrast, the PNP has both Republican and Democratic wings and PNP Resident Commissioners have caucused with both parties in the House depending on who the Commissioner was.  Once the goal of statehood is achieved, it is likely that the PNP will split and the Democrat wing will join the PPD to become the state's Democratic Party.