Merely asking United States residents if they are citizens of the country on the U.S. 2020 Census could “be bad for your health,” a New York Times report claims.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has asked Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to put the question asking if a U.S. resident is a citizen or not back on the Census, a move that Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach says would ensure electoral “fairness.”

The New York Times‘ latest report on the citizenship question, though, claims that asking residents if they are citizens could spur a public health crisis.

Advocates of the so-called citizenship question say it is merely clerical, an effort to ascertain how many noncitizens reside in the United States. But the question would have broad ramifications, not only for the politics of redistricting that will emerge from the census but for an issue that goes beyond partisanship: public health. [Emphasis added] The fear is that immigrants — even those in the country legally — will not participate in any government-sponsored questionnaire that could expose them, their family members or friends to deportation. But low response rates from any demographic group would undermine the validity of the next decade of health statistics and programs, health experts warn. Scientists use census data to understand the distribution of health conditions across the United States population. In turn, officials use the data to target interventions and distribute federal funding. [Emphasis added] “Data is the lifeblood of public health; it needs to be transparent and objective,” said Edward L. Hunter, the former chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Washington office and now the president of the de Beaumont Foundation, which focuses on public health. “The census will have cascading effects upon every rate, every percentage, every trend we monitor over time. It’s very unsettling for people who need to use that data.” [Emphasis added]

The New York Times report is just the latest effort by the establishment media and open borders lobby to derail a decision by Ross that puts the citizenship question back on the U.S. Census.

As Kobach has explained to Breitbart News, asking U.S. residents if they are citizens of the country is crucial to making sure that voter dilution is eliminated in congressional districts.

“Think of it this way. There are 710,000 people per representative in Congress. But if you live in a district like Maxine Waters’ district out in California, probably half or more of your district is illegal aliens,” Kobach recently explained. “And so you may only have 350,000 citizens voting in your district. Those citizens’ votes count twice as much as my vote or your vote if you live in a district that doesn’t have tons of illegal aliens.”

“So you have vote dilution where some peoples’ vote matters more than others because they have tons of illegal aliens in their district,” Kobach said.

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) has echoed Kobach’s argument, telling the New York Times that if American citizens were only counted in the U.S. Census for congressional districting purposes, the state of California — home to the largest illegal alien population in the nation — would “give up several congressional seats to states that actually honor our Constitution and federal law.”

“Only U.S. citizens should be represented in Congress,” King said.