There do not appear to be any stories about the mailing on the Fox News website.

This is not the first time the Republican National Committee has deployed this intentionally misleading tactic in an attempt to raise money. During the 2010 census, under the leadership of Chairman Michael Steele (now an MSNBC political analyst), the RNC sent out a fundraising solicitation also labeled “Congressional District Census” with a “do not destroy” warning. Congress responded by passing the Prevent Deceptive Census Look Alike Mailings Act, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama in April 2010. But some households reported receiving questionnaires from the RNC imitating official census documents again in 2018.

Misinformation regarding the census is a serious threat to the integrity of the count. The struggle over the Trump administration’s failed proposal to include a question about citizenship on the census has contributed significantly to the confusion around this year’s count. The idea of asking census respondents about their citizenship status was designed to undercount constituencies that tend to support Democrats. Recent polls have found that most Americans still believe that the census will include a question about citizenship status, even though its inclusion was blocked by the Supreme Court in July 2019. The Census Bureau has spent millions of dollars on a massive advertising campaign to facilitate participation and combat confusion caused by the Trump administration’s tactic. It has also set up a task force to contain the spread of misinformation online, partnering with Twitter, Facebook, Google, and YouTube.

The RNC’s attempts to squeeze money out of people who are confused by this process only adds to this noise, which threatens to derail this vital decennial count.

For more information on the 2020 census including how to participate, visit 2020census.gov.

Methodology

Media Matters searched for transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on cable news networks CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC; ABC’s Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and This Week; CBS’ This Morning, Evening News, and Face the Nation; and NBC’s Today, Nightly News, and Meet the Press from December 3, 2019, to February 27, 2020, that included any of the terms “Republican National Committee,” “RNC,” “GOP,” “donation,” or “fake” or any variations of the terms “fundraise” or “mislead” within close proximity of either of the terms “mailer” or “census.” We excluded teasers for upcoming segments.