Judicial Watch Statement on Supreme Court Ruling Blocking Citizenship Question for 2020 Census

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton made the following statement in response to the Supreme Court of the United States’ ruling today delaying, perhaps permanently, the Trump administration’s plan to include a question on the 2020 census inquiring about a respondent’s citizenship status.

It is unfortunate that the Supreme Court has endorsed the continued judicial harassment of the Trump administration. It ought to be an obvious point that the U.S. Census should try to figure out how many Americans and non-Americans are present in the United States.

The Trump administration should continue to try to move this issue through the courts in time for the 2020 census.

In mid-February, Judicial Watch joined with the Allied Educational Foundation (AEF) in filing an amici curiae brief in the United States Supreme Court, urging it to overturn the ruling of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York blocking the Secretary of Commerce from adding a question about citizenship to the 2020 census. The brief argues that including a citizenship question would help Judicial Watch and the government make sure only eligible citizens are on the voting rolls:

Adding a citizenship question to the decennial census would generate a massive amount of new data concerning the numbers of citizens and noncitizens in U.S. states and counties. To quibble about potential limitations in the data that would be collected is to miss the point. It cannot be the case that we are somehow better off with less information.

The mountain of new data generated by the decennial census question will assist private litigants and the Department of Justice in their efforts to enforce the National Voter Registration Act. Indeed, this data will overcome limitations identified by a federal court concerning the current data on citizenship.

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