Note: This article appeared in the Fall 2020 issue of PAA Affairs.
Introduction. In a presentation on August 7, 2020, former Census Bureau Director Ken Prewitt announced that no previous U.S. Census had suffered as much political interference as the 2020 Census. Many PAA members would agree with him. Examples abound to demonstrate that partisan politics have tainted the 2020 Census. The actions of the Trump Administration should concern all demographers and those interested in accurate and reliable data. The politicization of the 2020 Census is likely to result in less accurate data and a reduction in public trust of federal statistics. I believe that PAA members have a big stake in this issue, because undermining the quality of Census data will have a negative effect on the public perception of the people who make extensive use of these data (PAA members).
Appointment of Census Bureau Director. When Census Bureau Director John Thompson resigned in June 2017, the first two names floated by the Administration to replace him (Tom Hoffeller and Thomas Brunell) were linked to the Census primarily through partisan redistricting activities. Neither had any experience running a large bureaucracy or collecting data on a large scale. Census stakeholders expressed concern that appointing a Census Bureau Director whose only connection to the Census was partisan gerrymandering did not send the right signal for the leader of a scientific statistical agency like the Census Bureau. It later became known that Hoffeller had written an instrumental memo to Republican leaders documenting how adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census would advantage white Republicans.
Steve Dillingham was finally confirmed in January 2019, after the Census Bureau had gone without a director for more than a year and a half. The Trump Administration’s focus on trying to appoint a politically linked person as the head of the Census Bureau meant the loss of agency leadership during a key period for 2020 Census planning.
The 2020 Census Citizenship Question. On March 26, 2018, Secretary of Commerce Ross released a memo requiring the Census Bureau to add a question on citizenship to the 2020 Census questionnaire despite the Census Bureau’s advice that such a question would diminish the quality of the data and increase the costs of the 2020 Census. Concerns about adding a question on citizenship were raised by six former Directors of the Census Bureau and by a host of professional organizations, including the PAA.
Documents that came to light through litigation indicate that the attempt to add a citizenship question on the Census was politically motivated, aiming to suppress responses to the Census from immigrants. On June 27, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court effectively ruled that the Administration could not add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census. On July 11, 2019, The White House issued an Executive Order requiring federal agencies to provide the Census Bureau with administrative records that could be used to produce block-level citizenship data. The Executive Order caused confusion and concern about the citizenship question and stoked fears within the immigrant community, which are likely to result in census undercounts.
Spring and Summer 2020. A flurry of politically-tinged activities related to the 2020 Census has punctuated the news over the last few months. Much of this activity has recently been reviewed by the PAA. In the spring of 2020 the Census Bureau announced that, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was asking Congress to push back the statutory deadlines for delivery of apportionment data and redistricting data by 120 days and extending the data collection period by three months. These changes initially seemed to be widely accepted within political circles and supported by the White House, but things have changed.
Recognizing that the apportionment would need to be conducted before January 20, 2021 in order to ensure that his administration would control the process, President Trump ordered the Census Bureau to deliver the apportionment numbers by December 31, 2020, rather than April 30, 2021, as the Census Bureau had requested. In order to accommodate this earlier deadline, the Census Bureau has announced that it will end data collection by September 30, 2020 rather than October 31, 2020. Stakeholders point out that reducing the time for data collection will lower the quality of the census and hurt demographic groups with low self-response rates, such as Blacks and Hispanics, knowingly producing a larger undercounts of key Democratically-leaning groups.
Removing Undocumented Immigrants from the Census Apportionment Counts. On July 21, 2020, The White House issued an Executive Memorandum stating that it intended to remove undocumented immigrants from the Census apportionment counts used to assign seats in Congress, a plan widely viewed as unconstitutional. Excluding undocumented immigrants would have big implications for which states gain and lose seats. Litigation was filed immediately, but it is not clear how quickly it will move.
On August 6, 2020, the New York Times reported on a leaked Census Bureau memo that suggests the Department of Commerce expects the Census Bureau to provide figures for several different sub-categories of undocumented immigrants and perhaps the number of people imputed in the Census as well. The fear is that the Commerce Department will examine this data and select the combination of groups that provides the biggest advantage for Republicans in reapportionment. In the past, it has always been the Census Bureau that determined the most accurate population count of the states. Turning this process over to the Department of Commerce (and perhaps the White House) is unprecedented.
Two new political appointees at the Census Bureau. In late June 2020, the Trump Administration made two new political appointments for senior jobs within the Census Bureau. Neither person appears to be qualified for a high-ranking job at the Census Bureau and it is not clear what their duties are. The sudden placement of two new political appointees at the Census Bureau has been challenged by stakeholders, members of Congress, and even the Commerce Department Inspector General. On August 17, 2020, another political appointee was assigned to the senior staff of the Census Bureau, thus doubling the number of political appointees at the Census Bureau in the last two months.
Conclusion. It is important to recognize that the activities described above have not been perpetrated by the professionals at the Census Bureau. I believe our colleagues at the Census Bureau are trying hard to conduct a high-quality census in a very difficult landscape. PAA leadership, and the Government and Public Affairs Committee of PAA in particular, have been monitoring these events very closely and responding when appropriate. PAA activities include public statements, some of which have been cited here, but also informal engagement with key participants across the political spectrum. We are expecting a lot more political decisions this fall.