Understanding the U.S. Census is not easy and I certainly don’t expect people to have a firm grasp on things that I find confusing even after doing a fair amount of research. What’s relatively uncomplicated is the Republicans’ effort to use the Census for their own political benefit. They wanted to discourage non-citizens from participating so that they would be undercounted. Overall, this would benefit for the GOP (in most places, but not in Texas) by giving them an advantage in two main areas.
Census data is used to determine how many representatives will be awarded to each state, and this calculation also determines how many Electoral College votes each state will receive. The hope was that a skewed Census might give them a couple extra seats in Congress and a couple more Electoral College votes for president. There are also governmental programs that divide up money to the states based on population, and those numbers come from the Census. So, the Republicans figured they also get more money.
The U.S. Constitution says that the Census must be done every ten years and that the population must be “enumerated,” which means “counted” rather than estimated. What this means that the government can’t use the sampling techniques pollsters utilize to compensate for underrepresented populations that have a low response rate. If certain groups of people have a low participation rate, they are simply not included in the overall count. The Republican strategy for the Census has been to drive up the non-participation rate of non-citizens by including a citizenship question.
The lied repeatedly (including in court and under oath during congressional testimony) about why they wanted this question included. They said, for example, that they simply wanted an accurate count of eligible voters so they could better enforce the Voting Rights Act. Of course, you can ask felons about whether being a citizen automatically means that you can vote. In any case, voting rights had absolutely nothing to do with their motivation.
The [Commerce] department’s explanation was further undermined last month after plaintiffs uncovered computer files from a deceased Republican political strategist, Thomas B. Hofeller, who had first urged the incoming Trump administration in 2016 to consider adding the question to the next census.
The files included a study in which Mr. Hofeller concluded that a citizenship question was central to a strategy to increase Republican political power by excluding noncitizens and persons under voting age from the census figures used for drawing new political boundaries in 2021.
The Supreme Court did not buy the administration’s explanations and now it appears that the Census forms will be printed out with the citizenship not included.
The Trump administration, in a dramatic about-face, abandoned its quest on Tuesday to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, a week after being blocked by the Supreme Court.
Faced with mounting deadlines and a protracted legal fight, officials ordered the Census Bureau to start printing forms for next year’s head count without the question.
This is good news for Democrats (and Republicans in Texas), but there is going to be lasting damage from the fact that this legal dispute went on as long as it did (assuming it is truly over now). The media coverage around the Census has been almost entirely about the citizenship question, and surely some people won’t get the news that the administration lost. When combined with Trump’s other aggressive anti-immigrant policies and rhetoric, they will probably succeed in dragging down participation through pure intimidation.
Some people may reasonably want to know why the Census counts people who aren’t citizens. The simple answer is that the Constitution requires this. Everyone is supposed to be counted, and the seats in Congress are apportioned according to the total number of people. However, there’s nothing to prevent the states from drawing their districts based on the population of eligible voters, which could add population to rural districts and reduce it in urban ones. That might even be justifiable, although it’s not something Democrats would like to see happen.
The overall effort has no legitimate purpose however and has always been a raw power grab. Even the conservative Supreme Court could not conclude otherwise, so the administration finally gave up.
Trump, however, is still tweeting that the fight will go on even though his own Commerce Secretary says it’s over.
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement on Tuesday night that he respected the Supreme Court, but strongly disagreed with its ruling.
“The Census Bureau has started the process of printing the decennial questionnaires without the question,” he said. “My focus, and that of the Bureau and the entire Department is to conduct a complete and accurate census.”
Wilbur Ross perjured himself and belongs in jail.
A curious and surprising conclusion to the census case. It’s the first time the Court has ruled against Der Trumper, and the last time Roberts will do that–he has now burnished his phony “centrist” creds more than enough to cover his ongoing agenda of right-wing judicial extremism. It must be understood, however, that Roberts was unwilling to actually kill the case dead, but instead allowed Trumper and Ross to try to come up with a (less absurd) cover story for their intentional wrecking of the census. But it looks like Ross’s hive has lost the stomach for the lies required to proceed, they apparently don’t have the pathological constitution of the Great Liar in Chief!
As far as the case goes, the overt lawbreaking and preposterous lies by Ross & Team concerning the process under the Administrative Procedures Act was so great that Roberts apparently feared joining his 4 “conservative” boyz in their “Anything Goes” extremism, and thus handing National Trumpalism yet another democratically-illegitimate 5 man ruling. With the newly uncovered evidence of Repub racism proving the lies of diminutive turd Wilbur through a simple reading of the media accounts, the law profs would have gone crazy had Ross prevailed, and at some point the facade of the Court’s legitimacy and “legality” might actually become an issue for the American fools and silent Dem party. So I guess we have to say there is some breaking point for Roberts (arising from some mysterious concern), but not one for the other 4 right-wing extremists.
Finally, note (illegitimate) Justice Boofer has already decided he need not hide behind Roberts robes any longer, and can vote just as brazenly as Gorsuch, so his “rehabilitation” didn’t take too long!