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Source: 30dB.com – Census-and-Citizenship
So perhaps it should come as no surprise that his Administration wants to add a question to the U.S. Census that was last utilized in 1950. On Monday, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced that the upcoming 2020 head count will, for the first time in 70 years, query respondents about their citizenship. In a memo, Ross wrote, “I find that the need for accurate citizenship data and the limited burden that the reinstatement of the citizenship question would impose outweigh fears about a potentially lower response rate.” But that’s not how many others feel. As with quite a few Trump Administration initiatives, this one has stirred up outrage. States across the country — including California, New York, and Massachusetts — have decided to sue to prevent the change from taking effect. The Census is supposed to count all people in the country — not just documented citizens – in order to allocate federal funding properly and also determine the number of seats per state in the House of Representatives. It’s expected that large swaths of the population, especially undocumented immigrants, might opt to not respond at all if the citizenship question is on the list of asks. One counter argument is that the number of non-citizens should not help determine the structure of government. Basing voting maps on how many citizens are in a given area could also be a major political advantage for Republicans, although Ross has not openly acknowledged that. Over the past day, “Census + Citizenship” has a 16 percent positive score on Social. –Alex Shultz
Republished from 30dB