Oakland joins California’s lawsuit against census citizen question

In this March 7 file photo, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, right, accompanied by Gov. Jerry Brown, discusses remarks made by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, in Sacramento. In this March 7 file photo, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, right, accompanied by Gov. Jerry Brown, discusses remarks made by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, in Sacramento. Photo: Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press Photo: Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Oakland joins California’s lawsuit against census citizen question 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

Oakland on Friday joined California’s lawsuit against the Trump administration over the addition of a citizenship question to the 2020 census, arguing the inquiry would result in an undercount of the immigrant-rich city and reduce the federal funding it receives.

Oakland City Attorney Barbara Parker noted in the complaint that more than a quarter of Oakland residents are foreign born and about 15 percent are not citizens. Those figures were gleaned from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, which is separate from the census and asks about citizenship status. It goes to more than 3.5 million households each year, but doesn’t have the same impact on congressional apportionment or allocations of federal resources as the 10-year count.

Parker and other critics say the question’s inclusion will make many immigrants — those living here legally and illegally — afraid to participate in the census, which is meant to count all people in the country.

Fremont, Stockton, Los Angeles and Long Beach have also joined the lawsuit filed in March by Attorney General Xavier Becerra. San Francisco and San Jose are part of separate legal challenges to the census change.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross has defended the citizenship question, saying it would help enforce the Voting Rights Act. The question hasn’t been asked on the census since 1950.

“Secretary Ross determined that obtaining complete and accurate information to meet this legitimate government purpose outweighed the limited potential adverse impacts,” the department said in announcing the change in March.

Parker said the goal of the question is to “disenfranchise diverse communities like Oakland.”

“It is no secret that the Trump administration is dead set on reducing the voting power and federal funding for states like California and cities like Oakland whose residents overwhelmingly did not cast their votes for the current occupant of the White House,” she said in a statement. “The addition of a citizenship question clearly is a pretext for achieving that goal.”

Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kveklerov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kveklerov