Several congressmen have written to President Bush, and the Rev. Al Sharpton was jailed, protesting against the Navy's use of Vieques, an island off the coast of Puerto Rico, for bombing and shelling practice. One of 56 Defense Department live-fire ranges, the Navy reported to President Clinton in 1999 that for a number of reasons, Vieques is unique and vital to national defense. Protesters allege that the shelling causes health problems to people living about nine miles away: everything from cancer to a kind of "vibroacoustic disease" caused by the noise of the shelling. A 31-year-old man even complained that the shelling was causing his hair to fall out, "little by little."

Environmental attorney Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claimed that "Vieques has the highest rate of infant mortality and cancer in Puerto Rico." But the Puerto Rico Health Department noted that the statistics this claim was based on simply left out the years 1996 through 1998, which if counted in would have shown a lower rate of infant mortality than on the mainland. Also, the alarming claim about cancer rates was taken from a data set that showed, largely due the small population of Vieques, the cancer mortality rate fluctuated dramatically, alternately higher and lower than that of the mainland. Activists merely picked the year that best served their cause. The overall rate is actually much lower than that of many major U.S. cities.

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