Carol Rose, the executive director of the ACLU Massachusetts, applauded last week's Supreme Court decision that halted the Trump administration’s move to put a citizenship question on the 2020 U.S. census.
"It was a huge victory for democracy," Rose said during an interview with Boston Public Radio on Tuesday. “Every person should be counted. That’s how democracy works.”
The legal wrangling revolves around the desire of the Trump administration to put a question on the 2020 census that asks whether the respondent is a citizen of the United States. Opponents of the question, including Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth Bill Galvin and Attorney General Maura Healey, argued that the question would reasonably disincentivize immigrants from participating in the census out of fear of arrest and deportation. The administration claimed that the question was added to better help the Department of Justice enforce the Voting Rights Act by giving them a better understanding of where eligible voters of color live.
The issue has been the subject of a high profile debate, however, because the results of the census impact everything from how many congressional seats a state receives in the House of Representatives to how much federal funding is allocated to their Medicare program.
“People need to understand the importance of the census, because the census is the fundamental pillar of our voting rights, of the electoral college. It determines ... money for federal roads, for education, for health insurance. All of these kinds of bread and butter issues that ordinary people really care about,” Rose said.
On Thursday, after several fights in lower courts throughout the nation, the Supreme Court did not fully reject the administration’s ability to place a citizenship question on the census, but did reject the administration’s reasoning for wanting to do so.
“[Officials must] offer genuine justifications for important decisions, reasons that can be scrutinized by courts and the interested public,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion. “Accepting contrived reasons would defeat the purpose of the enterprise. If judicial review is to be more than an empty ritual, it must demand something better than the explanation offered for the action taken in this case.”
Part of the reason for the justices’ ruling was because Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross may not have been completely honest in his testimony about why he chose to place the question on the 2020 census. According to Ross, the reason is because the DOJ asked the administration to do so in 2017. However, former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach testified in front of Congress that he discussed including the question with Trump’s 2016 campaign and senior administration officials in early 2017, casting doubt on Ross’ statement. Three federal trial courts have also ruled that there was sufficient evidence that Ross was being dishonest when he stated that he included the question only after prodding from the DOJ.
The turmoil has left the fate of the 2020 census uncertain. Though the Census Bureau initially stated the census could go out no later than July 1, officials have previously said that “with exceptional effort and additional resources,” the deadline can be pushed back to October 31.
