US Census will end a month earlier; undercount of AAPI feared

The fingerprints of Donald Trump and Stephen Miller are all over the latest attempt to affect the US Census that could result in a drastic undercount of minorities and immigrants.

Last week, seemingly out of the blue, the United States Census Bureau announced it would end its efforts to count the number of people living in the country on Sept. 30, a month earlier than anticipated.

Originally, the count was supposed to end in July. But in April, the official census count was extended to Oct. 31, to help census-takers accommodate for social-distancing during the coronavirus pandemic.

"I believe that ending the enumeration a month early (relative to the previous modified schedule) will be an unprecedented disaster for people of color and low-income people. Our continuing monitoring indicates that there is still a huge gap between advantaged and disadvantaged neighborhoods," Paul Ong, director of the UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge and a former Census Bureau adviser, told ABC in an email.

"There are enormous political and economic implications from a racially biased census counted. Marginalized populations will be further disenfranchised and disproportionately left out for public funds and services," Ong wrote.

Forcing the Census Bureau to rush the census in the middle of a pandemic is part of an intentional plot to sabotage the census to reflect a less diverse and inaccurate portrait of America. A rushed census shortchanges critical operations that count people of color, American Indians, low-income people, and people experiencing homelessness. This would skew Congressional representation, redistricting, and critical funding for every state in the country.

Without commenting on the shortened data collection period, the Census Bureau on Monday issued a noncommtal statement:

We are committed to a complete and accurate 2020 Census. To date, 93 million households, nearly 63 percent of all households in the Nation, have responded to the 2020 Census. Building on our successful and innovative internet response option, the dedicated women and men of the Census Bureau, including our temporary workforce deploying in communities across the country in upcoming weeks, will work diligently to achieve an accurate count.

We appreciate the support of our hundreds of thousands of community-based, business, state, local and tribal partners contributing to these efforts across our Nation. The 2020 Census belongs to us all. If you know someone who has not yet responded, please encourage them to do so today online at 2020census.gov, over the phone, or by mail.

The Census Bureau quietly removed references to the 31 October deadline from its website and offered no explanation for the reversal and the decision to cut back on the timeline.

The abrupt reversal comes as Trump has shown renewed interest in using the census for partisan gain, and the decision to drop the additional follow-up appears to be an effort to produce data that disadvantages minority groups to use for the next decade.

Last month Trump issued a Presidential Memorandum requiring the Census Bureau to exclude undocumented individuals from the count that is used for reapportioning Congressional seats. Stephen Miller, Trump's top immigration advisor, who has consistently pushed for anti-immigrant policies. 

"The Constitutional mandate is clear that the U.S. Census must count the 'whole number of persons' in this country, regardless of immigration status," said a statement from Asian Americans Advancing Justice. 

"With this move, the President is pretending that people don’t exist and ignoring the Constitution in an attempt to tilt the scales of political power. Without an accurate count of everyone living in the U.S., the Trump Administration is sabotaging each of our communities to be under-resourced and underrepresented for the next decade."

Trump's earlier attempt to add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census and his recent memorandum to keep undocumented immigrants from being included in data reported for congressional apportionment have one thing in common: they’re unconstitutional and were put forth knowing they would likely be struck down by the courts. 

"The real goal is to scare and confuse immigrants, people in mixed-status families, and broader immigrant communities away from participating in the 2020 Census," said a statement from the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.