By Diego Graglia, FI2W web editor

With the end of Senate hearings Thursday, Spanish-language media are taking Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation to the Supreme Court as a given — and Puerto Ricans in New York and elsewhere are getting ready to celebrate.

“This has been bigger than when Menudo came to New York,” Bronx State Assemblyman José Rivera told New York newspaper El Diario/La Prensa. He promised to organize a parade through the borough’s streets when the judge, who grew up there, is confirmed to the nation’s highest court.

“The Bronx was abandoned, but Sotomayor is rescuing it,” he said.

“Now the whole world understands what we already know — that the days when buildings were burning are in the past,” Borough President Rubén Díaz Jr. told the newspaper.

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By Diego Graglia, FI2W web editor

While the whole nation will be watching to see if New York-born judge Sonia Sotomayor becomes the third woman and first Latina on the U.S. Supreme Court, Hispanics will be paying special attention to Sotomayor’s Senate confirmation hearings set to begin Monday.

“It is expected the hearings will send the first Hispanic woman to the highest American court,” wrote Univision.com on Sunday.

“Despite the importance of an event that happens few times throughout the country’s history, tempers are calmer than could be expected,” wrote Los Angeles newspaper La Opinión.

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SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Sonia Sotomayor has gone from virtually unknown to a symbol of national pride for Puerto Ricans after her nomination by President Barack Obama to the U.S. Supreme Court.

“This has been a major event in our country, very flattering,” said Marcial Díaz, 61, a Humacao resident who chose the Spanish word país, or country, to refer to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

“In Puerto Rico, they might not know how she decided even one of her cases but for them, and for us, she’s Puerto Rican,” said Susanne Ramírez de Arellano, news director at the Univisión affiliate in Puerto Rico.

“She is a heroine, as (Joe) Acaba, the astronaut, is a hero, as Benicio del Toro is a hero.”

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