By Brent Kendall and Janet Adamy
WASHINGTON—The Supreme Court on Friday denied the Trump administration’s request to postpone an imminent trial in a case challenging the government’s decision to ask people on the 2020 census whether they are U.S. citizens.
The trial is scheduled to begin Monday in a New York federal court, where a group of states, cities, mayors and immigrant advocacy groups are challenging the legality of the administration’s inclusion of the citizenship question.
The Trump administration says the trial is improper, and the Justice Department filed emergency legal papers with the Supreme Court seeking to stop it. The high court rejected the request in a two-sentence written order.
As is its custom on emergency matters, the court didn’t explain its reasoning. Three conservative justices—Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch—said they would have postponed the trial.
As required by the Constitution, the government conducts a census every 10 years for a full count of the U.S. population, data that is used to apportion congressional seats. Census figures also are used in the allocation of federal funding for some government programs.
Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross, whose department oversees the Census Bureau, announced in March that the 2020 census would ask all U.S. households about citizenship status.
The census hasn’t asked that question in 70 years, though it does appear on a different Census Bureau questionnaire, called the American Community Survey, which is sent annually to roughly 2 million households.
Mr. Ross said citizenship data would help the Justice Department with enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. His challengers in court said this explanation was a pretext, and that the real motivation was the administration’s tough-on-immigration approach.
The plaintiffs say the inclusion of the citizenship question would deter participation in the census and result in undercounting of immigrant communities, which they say would adversely affect them on an array of issues, including funding for transportation, child development programs and Medicaid.
The Justice Department argues that the pending trial is improper because plaintiffs plan to delve into Mr. Ross’s subjective motivations, instead of focusing on the Commerce Department’s written record on the reason for the census change.
The Supreme Court intervened last month and partially granted an earlier DOJ request, barring the plaintiffs from taking a deposition of Mr. Ross, in which he would have had to answer questions under oath. But the court allowed depositions of other officials, and it declined to otherwise curtail how the case would proceed.
On Friday, the court turned down the administration’s trial-postponement request without first asking the challengers to file legal papers in response. Normally, the court requires such a response on appeals that it believes may have merit.
“DOJ has tried every trick in the book (and then some) to block this case—and failed every time. You really have to wonder what they’re trying to hide,” said Amy Spitalnick, spokeswoman for New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood, a Democrat and one of the state officials that brought the lawsuit.
The Justice Department declined to comment.
Next week’s trial is one of several hurdles facing the 2020 census. The bureau wants most Americans to answer it online, a major switch that should make the count more efficient but also creates the risk of cybersecurity threats and technical glitches.
The Census Bureau has scaled back field testing for the new operations, and meanwhile it is operating without a permanent director.
In addition, a tight labor market is making it more difficult for the bureau to recruit thousands of temporary workers to staff 248 area census offices across the country. In early hiring, Census Bureau officials reported smaller than expected applicant pools, declined offers and turnover, according to a Government Accountability Office report released in August. That could make it even more difficult to enumerate hard-to-count groups including minorities, GAO said.
Simply getting the final census questionnaire printed also becomes more complex given the continuing legal challenge. The Government Printing Office plans to award a contract for up to $140 million of printing and mailing work this month, after a deal with commercial printer Cenveo fell apart when the company filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection earlier this year.
“The more clarity you have, the easier it is to prepare,” said John Thompson, a former Census Bureau director who opposes the citizenship question and is expected to testify next week on behalf of the plaintiffs.
The Trump administration’s nominee for Census Bureau director, Steven Dillingham, told lawmakers at a confirmation hearing in October that he would not take a position on the citizenship question.
“It will be determined by the courts, and it would be my responsibility, if confirmed, to administer the decennial census in accordance and consistent with that judicial decision,” Mr. Dillingham said.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
No comments:
Post a Comment