The messages were considered vulgar, misogynistic, racist, and homophobic toward several individuals and groups, and discussed how they would use the media to target potential political opponents.

The leak came in the midst of allegations by former Secretary of Treasury of Puerto Rico, Raúl Maldonado Gautier, that his department boasted an "institutional mafia" that Rosselló was involved in.

On July 8, 2019, a small segment of Telegram chat messages between Ricardo Rosselló and various members of his cabinet, former advisors, and former campaign managers were leaked and spread by the local press.

[28] Before Rosselló's resignation was effective, he announced his nomination of Pedro Pierluisi to the position of Secretary of State on July 31, with the intention of having him succeed the office of Governor of Puerto Rico.

That same day that, Pierluisi was sworn in as acting secretary of state,[34] while a new document with an additional 100 pages of the controversial chat was released by journalist Sandra Rodríguez Cotto.

As a result, the President of the Senate, Thomas Rivera Schatz, challenged the legitimacy of his ascent to office in the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico.

Afterwards, the then-Secretary of Justice, Wanda Vázquez was sworn in as the new governor of Puerto Rico, becoming the second woman to assume the office and the first person to take over the position by succession and not by a democratic election.

In July 2019, among calls for her husband to resign due to a scandal stemming from his involvement in the incriminating group chat, his wife, First Lady Beatriz Rosselló, was criticized for her management of Unidos por Puerto Rico (transl.

In August 2018, at least 10 trailers which held these supplies were found abandoned in a lot near a state election office; according to The New York Times, they had "broke[n] open and became infested by rats".

[41][42] Unidos por Puerto Rico, which received $41 million in donations, was run for a time by Jorge del Pino, brother-in-law of lobbyist Elías Sánchez, who was also involved in the group chat scandal.

[13] On August 28, 2020, the executive director of the Puerto Rico Government Ethics Office announced the investigation into the leaked 889-page chat dialog between Rosselló and members of his cabinet was completed.

The investigation, which began on July 15, 2019, was closed due to inability to authenticate evidence, an essential element for the imputation of unethical conduct, rendering impossible for the administrative prosecution of its participants.

Witnesses that were interviewed admitted the instant-messaging application Telegram was the main form of communication between Rosselló and members of his cabinet but declined to authenticate the content of the leaked document, expressing malevolous alterations were presented on it.

The Department of Justice of Puerto Rico was also asked to cooperate in providing extracted information from cell phones of some of the chat's participants, with the purpose of obtaining unaltered and authentic content directly from the source, but was not shared due to the criminal investigation they're still conducting.

[8][54] The crowd size was reported to have eclipsed the previous record set when protestors gathered in 2004 to denounce the US Navy training missions in the island-municipality of Vieques.

[12][55] Many protested in creative ways, while doing yoga, holding signs while scuba diving under water, on horse-back, drumming, with face-painting, via group prayers,[56] and with public demonstration of reminders of those who died in Hurricane María.

[65] Congressman Raúl Grijalva (D-Arizona), chair of the House Natural Resources Committee, which oversees Puerto Rico policy, called for the governor to resign amid the scandal.

[66] Jenniffer González, Puerto Rico's sole representative in Congress, said that she thought Rosselló should not seek re-election the following year as a result of the incident.