Trump gov't will continue awkward efforts to include citizenship question in Census

Attorneys of the Justice Department are still looking for a way to include a citizenship question on the 2020 Census. If all else fails, Donald Trump said he would consider issuing an Executive Order to add the controversial question.
"It's one of the ways that we're thinking about doing it, very seriously," he said.

U.S. District Judge George J. Hazel Hazel had expressed mounting frustration with the mixed signals the administration was sending, first telling him on Tuesday that the question was off only to have Trump tweet the next day that the administration was "absolutely moving forward" with efforts to include the question.

The government, under directions of the Commerce Department, has already begun the process of printing the census questionnaire without that question.

On Friday (July 5), Hazel adopted a scheduling order allowing discovery to begin immediately in the racial intent claims brought by MALDEF in the Maryland federal court.

Hazel issued the order in response to filings by the Trump administration and plaintiffs regarding how to proceed in light of the government’s continued inability to tell the court what it will do to attempt to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling last month on the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) claim challenging the late addition of a citizenship question to the 2020 Census.

MALDEF and Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC (Advancing Justice | AAJC) sued the administration and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in May 2018 on behalf Latino and Asian American individuals, Native Americans, social service nonprofits, state legislative associations, civil rights groups, voting rights organizations, and community partnerships that would be forced to divert resources to combat a potential severe undercount in their respective communities.

In addition to a successful claim under the APA like the one the Supreme Court ruled upon, the lawsuit included the unique allegation that the Trump administration officials and others intentionally conspired to deprive racial minorities of their constitutional rights by adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census. Those claims will now move forward.

“To be clear, orders in several courts across the country remain in place that prevent the Trump administration from proceeding with a citizenship question on Census 2020," said Thomas A. Saenz, MALDEF president and general counsel. "Until those orders are removed or modified, no executive order or other decision can permit the citizenship question to move forward.

“There is nothing talismanic about an executive order. Such an order does not override a Supreme Court or other judicial decision; nor does it overturn or circumvent the congressionally-established process for determining the content of the Census. Our government is not a dictatorship.

“There are also no mulligans in the law. An executive order does not result in ignoring the abundant evidence of unconstitutional racial discrimination that actually lies behind the late addition of the citizenship question to the Census, especially when Donald Trump was integrally involved in the conspiracy to add the question for legally improper reasons," continued Saenz.

By Friday evening, the American Civil Liberties Union asked a federal judge in New York to permanently block the administration from adding the citizenship question to the 2020 census.

"The Trump administration repeatedly argued the census forms could not be altered after June 30. They've now changed their tune because the Supreme Court ruled against them. They can't have it both ways," said Dale Ho, director of the ACLU's voting rights project.

The Census Bureau’s own experts have said a citizenship question would discourage immigrants from participating in the survey and result in a less accurate census that would redistribute money and political power away from Democratic-led cities where immigrants tend to cluster to whiter, rural areas where Republicans do well.

The government's facilating positions and the plaintiff's counter moves could hurt the census, said John Yang, president and executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice. The group is a plaintiff in the Maryland case. “The government is trying to sow seeds of confusion in the public,” Yang said.

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Census thrown into disarray with Trump tweet

Leave it to Donald Trump to muck things up over including a citizenship question in the 2020 Census.

Clearly, the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing in Trump's administration. 

After the Supreme Court let a lower court decision banning the question stand, the Commerce Department announced that the Census forms would be printed without the controversial question asking about the respondent's citizenship.

Less than 24 hours after that announcement, Trump tweeted that his administration is still seeking a delay of the Census so his lawyers could come up with a new argument to include the question.

Judge George Hazel who rendered the initial decision, saw the tweet. He said the tweet Wednesday morning "directly contradicted the position" the Justice Department articulated on Tuesday.

On Wednesday (July 3) he called the DOJ attorneys and lawyers for the plaintiffs in a conference call to gain some clarity.

"We at the Department of Justice have been instructed to examine whether there is a path forward consistent with the Supreme Court's decision that would allow us to include the citizenship question on the census," Jody Hunt, the assistant attorney general for the Civil Division, told Hazel Wednesday afternoon.

"We think there may be a legally available path. We're examining that, looking at near-term options to see whether that's viable and possible," he added.

Hazel, who appeared to be losing his patience, ordered the government attorneys to return Friday at 2 p.m. EDT to say what the government intends to do: go ahead with the Census as the Commerce Department said or to pursue further legal action to delay the Census.

Critics, which include a host of civil rights organizations including Asian Americans Advancing Justice (AAAJ) and Asian American Legal Defense Education Fund (AALDEF), argue including the citizenship question is politically motivated and it would suppress responses from immigrants and racial minorities.

They believe this would benefit the Republican Party when it came to the drawing-up of districts for elections and calculating how much funding each state receives.

The ACLU's Voting Rights Project Director Dale Ho, who argued against the use of the question in the Supreme Court, reacted to the Trump administration's reversal:

“The Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration’s effort to add a census citizenship question was illegal because it was based on a ‘contrived’ rationale. Despite that, and despite DOJ’s repeated statements that the census questionnaire cannot be changed after June 30, the administration is now examining whether it can concoct a ‘new rationale’ for its citizenship question. The answer is no, it cannot — at least not a legal one. Any attempt at an end run around the Supreme Court’s decision will be unsuccessful, and will be met swiftly in court.”

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Census will not include citizenship question; Trump still trying to delay Census

UPDATE 11a.m., July 3: Donald Trump tweeted this morning saying that he is still trying to delay the Census in order to reargue the case for the citizenship question. The original post is below the tweet.

In a major setback to the GOP and Donald Trump, the printing of the Census form is proceeding without the controversial question asking about a person's citizenship.

Dale Ho, who argued the Supreme Court case as director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Voting Rights Project, said on Tuesday (July 2), “Everyone in America counts in the census, and today’s decision means we all will.”

The Commerce Department will go ahead with the printing of the dicennial tally despite Trump's request to delay the Census.

“This decision to move forward with the census without the problematic citizenship question is a victory for democracy!" said Rep. Judy Chu, chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. 

"Despite the false answer Secretary (Wilbur) Ross gave me about the origin of this question, we know from court records that the citizenship question was put forward by a Republican strategist looking to help the Republican party. In order to do so, they wanted to use the citizenship question as a way to frighten immigrants away from the census, hiding the true number of people in this country, and jeopardizing federal representation and funding for everything from housing to transportation to education.," continued Chu from California."

After the US Supreme Court turned down the administration appeal of a lower court decision to reject the question, Trump said last week he was looking at pushing a delay in the population count over the issue, which he's positioned as part of his broader crackdown on undocumented immigrants.

"I have asked the lawyers if they can delay the Census, no matter how long, until the United States Supreme Court is given additional information from which it can make a final and decisive decision on this very critical matter," he tweeted.

Asian Americans Advancing Justice and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund both sued to block the question based on the new evidence. Others joined in support.

The two groups along with other civil rights organizations argued that asking the citizenship question was an attempt to dissuade minorities and immigrants from taking part in the Census. 

The Census' own study estimated that the question would lead to an undercount of millions of people in the US.

Most recently, challengers of the question presented an unpublished 2015 study by a Republican redistricting expert as evidence that citizenship data would benefit Republicans when new political boundaries are drawn based on the 2020 census.

In the 2016 and the 2018 elections, most immigrants and people of color who were citizens  tended to register themselves as Democrats.

The US Census, mandated by the Constitution, forms the basis for representation in government and the allocation of federal funds for everything from infrastructure to social services.

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Trump administration appeals ruling blocking Census question on citizenship

AS EXPECTED, the Trump administration is appealing a court ruling that blocks plans to add a controversial citizenship question to the 2020 census.

The Department of Justice wants the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the decision about the question that was delivered only two days earlier in a New York court.

In that case, U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman concluded the decision by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who oversees the Census Bureau, to add a question about U.S. citizenship to census forms was "unlawful" and made "a veritable smorgasbord of classic, 

clear-cut" violations of the Administrative Procedure Act.

The appeal sets up the likelihood that the case will proceed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
In anticipation of that happening, the High Court suspended scheduled oral arguments on the controversial citizenship question that was originally scheduled for Feb. 19.

in a brief order on Friday (Jan. 18), the justices decided to put matters on hold after a federal district court judge on Jan. 15 ruled the government could not proceed with its plans. Challengers to the census question then asked the justices to dismiss the related pending appeal, saying the issue was moot.

Later Friday, the justices removed it from the court's calendar and filed a docket entry noting that the "briefing schedule is suspended pending further order from the court."

Civil rights groups and several state Attorneys General say including the question regarding citizenship would dampen responses from legal and undocumented immigrants, resulting in an inaccurate talley, which would affect congressional representation and allocation of federal funds.
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NY judge blocks citizenship question for 2020 Census

Rep. Grace Meng, D-NY, has been outspoiken against incluidng the citizenship question on the 2020 Census.

U.S. DISTRICT JUDGE Jesse M. Furman Tuesday (Jan. 15) blocked Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross’s plan to add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, agreeing with a coalition of states, cities, mayors and immigrant rights groups that Secretary Ross’s decision would be illegal.

“The Trump Administration’s plan to sabotage the 2020 Census by adding a last-minute citizenship question has been deeply troubling,” said Rep. Grace Meng, D-NY. 

“Since last year, I have continuously warned that asking respondents if they are citizens would likely decrease response rates and as a result produce an inaccurate and incomplete count that would have a decade’s worth of consequences," Meng added. 

"It would impact the distribution of federal resources and the number of Congressional districts that each state receives. This was a politically-motivated question against immigrant communities that we now know was pushed by former White House strategist Steve Bannon. It deserves to never see the light of day.”

The citizenship question would have provided an inaccurate tally, said critics. The Census is mandated by the U.S. Constitution aand provides critical population data that helps allocate billions of federal dollars and draw political districts so that Congress and state legislatures are representative of the voting population.

“Hard data and commonsense show that the citizenship question would intimidate vulnerable communities and massively suppress participation in the 2020 Census, with damaging effects that would undermine our democracy for a decade or more,” said Thomas Wolf, the counsel with the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program who leads the center’s census project.

The Commerce Department, which oversees the Census Bureau, announced in March that it would add the question, triggering lawsuits around the country from advocates for a fair and accurate census. The advocates say a citizenship question would scare away immigrants and others concerned about how government may end up using the information about their citizenship status. President Trump’s hostile rhetoric against undocumented immigrants has heightened those concerns.

Judge Furman’s ruling underscores the need for Congress, which is negotiating funding language that would remove the citizenship question from the census, to act and prevent an undercount.

“Congress can end the controversy over the citizenship question once and for all by exercising its supervisory powers over the census and ordering the question off,” Wolf said.

Ruling after a trial last month on two consolidated lawsuits in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan, Judge Furman determined that the Trump administration departed unjustifiably from important federal laws governing how government agencies should make decisions, concluding, among other things, that Secretary Ross “alternately ignored, cherry-picked, or badly misconstrued the evidence in the record before him.”

“It is critical that we have an accurate census so we can know who is in our country, where they live, and what their needs are," said Rep. Judy Chu, D-CA, chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. "But with this citizenship question, Trump tried to twist the 2020 census into just another weapon in his war on immigrants, aiming to drive down responses and intentionally leading to a less representative government by hiding millions."

Tuesday's decision ends the Trump administration’s months-long campaign to postpone the case and avoid a final ruling. The district court’s opinion also sets a strong precedent ahead of trials in other challenges to the citizenship question, laying out a roadmap for additional victories in federal courts in California and Maryland.

The Trump administration will likely appeal the court ruling, setting up further potential showdowns in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court, which have already ruled against the administration on several issues in earlier phases of these cases.

“Although the Supreme Court will likely have the final say on this issue, we will continue to oppose any attempt to reinstate the citizenship question,” said Meng. “We don’t need a citizenship question; we need an accurate census count!”

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What's up, 2019?: Census question stokes fear in AAPI community; resurrects horror of Japanese American incarceration

VIEWS FROM THE EDGE

and ASAM NEWS

EVERY 10 YEARS, the United States is mandated by the Constitution to count every person in the U.S. 

The next Census will take place in 2020, but 2019 will be filled with debate over whether or not to ask the question about citizenship. Chief among issues is a question asking for the citizenship status of individuals.

Last year, against the recommendations of the Census Bureau, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross approved a request from the Justice Department to add the following question to the 2020 census: “Is this person a citizen of the United States?” despite the fact the question hasn't been used since 1950.

EDITOR'S NOTE: What's Up, 2019: is part of series of posts about issues facing the AAPI community in the coming year. 

• Trump wants to deport public benefit recipients
• Immigration reform strikes at heart of Asian America

"Make no mistake – immigrants and citizens who have immigrants in their household will be reluctant to participate in a census that asks about citizenship," warns Asian Americans Advancing Justice, a nonprofit legal advancy group in a statement.

"The resulting undercount will be devastating to the Asian Pacific American community because as a whole, they are the 'newest' Americans, with 92 percent of the community comprised of individuals who are foreign-born or are the children of immigrants," the statement continues.

Adding the question in 2020, in the current atmosphere of xenophobia spurred by the anti-immigration rhetoric coming out of the White House, will depress an actual count, say civil rights advocates. They believe that immigrants, no matter their legal status, will hesitate to participate in the decennial count out of fear that the information would be used against them to the point of getting deported.

Their fear is not unfounded. The reason the question was thrown out in the first place is because the Census was used to identify, locate and imprison Japanese Americans during World War II.

Despite the government’s denial, records confirm that the Bureau provided the U.S. Secret Service with specific names and residential addresses of Japanese Americans.

According to WAMU, U.S. Army Lt. Gen. John DeWitt, who oversaw and supported the mass removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast, wrote in a 1943 report for the War Department: “The most important single source of information prior to the evacuation was the 1940 Census of Population.”

“The consequences of adding this question are far too great to just sit by silently,” says Sharon Sakamoto, 75, who was born in the Minidoka prison camp located in Idaho.

TWITTER / NEW YORK IMMIGRATION COALITION

Rep. Grace Meng speaks at a New York City rally protesting the citizenship question.

Former Commerce Secretary Norman Mineta also opposes the proposed question and wants the government to remember its history. Mineta, 87, was sent to a Wyoming prison camp with his family when he was 10 years old, and worries that the intentions of the citizenship question is to intimidate. 

“One of the things it does is intimidate people,” he says. “All I could think of was what it was like for [Japanese-American] evacuees to be facing a census and whether or not that information could be used.”

Supporters of the question, added at the last minute and skipped the normal testing before being approved, say its inclusion is logical and necessary to enforce the Voting Rights Act.

“I’m perplexed and surprised that of the sudden concern over the Voting Rights Academy. We have legislation in Congress that we can work on together if they are concerned about the Voting Rights Act,” said Rep. Grace Meng after hearings involving Secretary Ross. “The Trump campaign, in my previous unrelated question, was about the Trump campaign sending out a campaign email asking about how people felt about the inclusion of this new citizenship question. So, they are, indeed, politicizing the census.”

After the hearings, it was learned that Ross lied to the members of the House Commerce Committee. While under oath, Meng asked Ross where the question came from and he lied, saying he wasn’t sure but that it wasn’t him or the White House that was involved. Emails show former White House aide Steve Bannon asked Ross to do it while he was still at the White House.

"He (Ross) lied to my face," said Meng. She said it is now clear that adding the question was politically motivated. Critics, including former Census Bureau directors, fear the administration will use the question to suppress voter participation and will undercount the immigrants who fear the information will be used tby Immigration and Customs Enforcement to deport immigrants, no matter their status.

The controversial citizenship question has previously raised suspicions due to the current administration’s ongoing anti-immigrant tactics. And despite the government shutdown, the administration will still face a trial in San Francisco on Jan. 7.

The lawsuit by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra contends that if the Census undercounts immigrants, it would produce an inaccurate talley violating its constitutional purpose, which is to divide up seats in the U.S. House of Representatives based on the total U.S. population. 

Census numbers also are used to allocate billions of dollars in federal funds for infrastructure, law enforcement, education, health and other social services.

If immigrants shun the Census, it could reduce the number of congressional seats and the amount of federal funding in states with large numbers of foreign-born residents, such as California, which has been a thorn in Trump's side with its opposition to many of his proposals, New York, Nevada, Hawaii, Washington and also GOP-dominated states such as Texas and Florida. 

This summer, the U.S. Census is planning to field test a 2020 census form that includes the controversial citizenship question to find out if the question might affect responses to the upcoming national head count.

"This foolish decision will produce long-lasting negative effects. Immigrant communities, fearful of deportation because of the administration's rhetoric, will be less likely to respond out of concern their information is not confidential," wrote Rep. Grace Meng, D-NY, in a New York Times oped. 

"If our data is skewed, then our approaches to public health, infrastructure and other national issues will be faulty," she continued. "An undercount will mean our neediest communities may not receive much needed care. Students who rely on the National School Lunch Program may go without lunch, affecting their health and academic goals. In the end, a citizenship question will not produce an accurate census. It will create an inaccurate count, instill fear in our communities, and undermine our ability to help people."
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Census citizenship question will harm AAPI communities

INCLUDING A QUESTION on a person's citizenship status will result in an undercount of minority communities, affect Congressional representation and impact a host of other issues that depend on accurate data provided by the U.S. Census.

AAPI civil rights leaders and census say the citizenship question was the wrong decision by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and its inclusion in the 2020 Census form is likely to jeopardize a fair and accurate census.

“I’m incredibly concerned by the inclusion of an untested citizenship question whose sole impact will be to suppress participation in the 2020 census," said Rep. Judy Chu of California. "The census is essential for ensuring fair and accurate representation and distribution of government resources. But by including a question on citizenship, which is not required by the Constitution, the Trump Administration is exploiting the fear of immigrant communities who are already reticent to divulge personal information to the federal government." 

California, with the largest number of immigrants, documented and undocumented, could lose Congressional representatives. Presently, the state has the most members in the House of Representatives.

According to California's Attorney General Xavier Becerra, the U.S. Constitution requires an actual count of the population in the decennial census, regardless of citizenship status. Including a question about citizenship could intimidate or discourage people and result in an inaccurate census that might "translate into several million people not being counted," he said.

"This latest move by the Trump administration to threaten California is not just a bad idea, it's against the law," Becerra told reporters. "We're going to defend every one of our rights to make sure that every one of our people who has worked hard to make California the sixth-largest economy in the world is counted.

California's lawsuit is separate from the multi-state lawsuit filed by 11 others states so far. That legal challenge includes New York, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington 

The census is not about who should be in the country. It’s about understanding who is currently in the country and it should not be treated as just another weapon in Trump’s anti-immigrant arsenal. It’s too important for our schools, roads, hospitals, and communities that we have an accurate reporting. It’s also concerning that this question was apparently rushed into the census, without undergoing the usual testing that other questions do.

"Suppression of responses risks significant undercounting in the 2020 Census that will disproportionately impact communities of color," said Chu.

Critics say that the addition of the citizenship question is just another bargaining chip for Trump in his anti-immigrant agenda, which includes Muslim travel bans, a radical immigration policy overhaul limiting family reunification and a border wall between the U.S. and Mexico.

SCREEN CAPTURE / MSNBC

Chu points out that the other questions included in the Census took years of testing before they were added to the questionnaire. 

"Existing Census Bureau research already documents the growing reluctance of survey respondents to take part in any Census Bureau surveys – all due to the “climate of fear” created by the Trump Administration’s hostile policies and rhetoric,” said Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. “The civil rights community is speaking with a clear, united voice: this decision is wrong for our communities, our democracy, and our country, and we will fight to overturn it.”

“The citizenship question and similar policies by this administration seek to leave minority communities undercounted, under-represented, and under-protected. The Commerce Department has shirked its responsibility of ensuring that all questions are properly tested and lead to accurate data,” said John C. Yang, president and executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC.

The administration's actions thus far in regards to immigrants is not do much for inculcating trust in the federal government. The question is unecessarily intrusive and will raise concerns in all households whether they are native-born or foreign-born, citizen or non-citizen, documented or undocumented. The AAPI community should remember that in recent times when the Census included the question about citizenship, that information was used to round up Japanese/Americans and place them in internment camps.
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