The Democrat who oversees money for the Census Bureau said Tuesday he will not allow President Trump to stop the printing of the 2020 questionnaire to add a citizenship question.

Rep. Jose E. Serrano, New York Democrat and chair of the Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the Commerce Department, said the forms are already being printed without the question, and any move now would mean that money has been wasted.

He said reprinting now could cost taxpayers “hundreds of millions” of dollars.

“I want to make one thing clear: I have no intention of allowing this flagrant waste of money,” Mr. Serrano said.

The administration had set a June 30 deadline for making a decision about the citizenship question.

Just days before that deadline the Supreme Court, while ruling that such a question is legal, ruled that it didn’t believe the administration’s reasoning for why it wanted to include it in the 2020 count. The court said it would allow a do-over — but the June 30 deadline was too tight, and the Commerce Department began to print the forms without the question.

Mr. Trump has since said he wants the question included anyway, and has ordered his team to try to shoehorn it in.

That will likely result in further legal battles and, as more questionnaires are printed, the sunk costs will grow.

Sign up for Daily Newsletters Manage Newsletters

Copyright © 2020 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.