Puerto Rico’s next governor is still a mystery but a potential successor was just approved by the House

As Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló moves to step down, a political crisis is deepening in the US territory. Legislators and political experts don’t have a clear idea who will replace him.

Lawyer and politician Pedro Pierluisi was nominated by Rosselló as secretary of state — a position that would place him first in line to become the next governor — but his confirmation is still up in the air.

The island’s House of Representatives voted Thursday and confirmed him for the role but there’s no guarantee that he’ll get the job.

He earned 26 votes in favor of his nomination and 21 votes against him.

Puerto Rico’s constitution states that the secretary of state must be confirmed by the House and the Senate. And the Senate’s leader announced Thursday that they will hold a vote next week.

“The vote by the House on nominee Attorney Pedro Pierluisi deserves to be respected by all. It now heads to the Senate. We will approach it with the deepest sense of responsibility,” Thomas Rivera Schatz, the president of the Senate, tweeted on Friday.

Pierluisi has told CNN that he is not clear what will happen at 5:01 p.m. — the moment when Rosselló is expected to leave office.

If Pierluisi can’t be named governor Friday, Justice Secretary Wanda Vázquez Garced will likely become governor.

Vázquez Garced previously said she doesn’t want the job but has said she would follow the rule of law.

“If the time comes, we’ll assume the responsibility imposed by the Constitution and the law,” Vázquez Garced tweeted Thursday.

CNN has reached out to the governor’s office for comment.

The new governor will assume the job until the end of term in January 2021.

Shortly before his effective resignation, Rosselló’s signed a bill into law to move the Democratic presidential primary election from June to March.

“The law intends to bring national attention to Puerto Rico, especially in the upcoming Democratic primaries. Currently, the primary is to be held in June, which reduces the impact we may have. By making Puerto Rico an early voting state, candidates will be forced to pay attention to our needs,” he said in a statement.

Rosselló’s historic resignation came after nearly two weeks of mass protests in Old San Juan and in the midst of political scandal involving the release of crude, sexist and homophobic chat messages between the governor and members of his inner circle.

Following the footsteps of his father, former Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Rosselló, he ran for governor in 2016 and took office in January 2017.

The eventual downfall of his administration may have been set in motion by Hurricane Maria in 2017. The devastating storm made landfall less than nine months after Rosselló became governor.

In the wake of Hurricane Maria there were widespread problems with the distribution of food, water and other vital supplies to those who needed it most. Many residents were left in the dark for months when the island’s antiquate power grid was heavily damaged by the storm.

Nearly a year after the storm, the Rosselló administration finally admitted that Hurricane Maria left several thousand people dead — not the dozens that had been the official line.