The Actual Population May Not Be Counted and Why You Should Be Outraged
The authors of Project 2025 proposed adding a citizenship question to the census, leading to a deliberate undercounting of populations with high rates of immigrants. Not only that, but these extremists plan to appoint political officials to decide who does or doesn’t get counted in the next census, instead of impartial, nonpartisan actors.
This process is headed by The Heritage Foundation who included in Project 2025, “Any successful conservative Administration must include a citizenship question in the census.”
Research by the Census Bureau has shown that including the question “Is this person a citizen of the United States?” on forms is likely to discourage many households with Latino or Asian American residents from getting counted in official population totals.
According to the Constitution of the United States 14th Amendment, the congressional apportionment numbers must include the “whole number of persons in each state.” But Trump officials wanted to make the unprecedented move of excluding unauthorized immigrants.
Why not count only citizens?
- Money, House Representatives, the Electoral College, employment stats and various apportionments are based upon population. Certain population areas would then be short changed. This, then, favors the Republican Party by discounting many urban areas.
- It violates the 14th Admendment.
- It undercounts the poverished and instills fear in legal immigrants.
- It will harm Black communities and other communities of color, undermining efforts to achieve an accurate census count and weakening the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) capacity to defend voting rights.
References:
- NPR.org, Hansi Lo Wang, October 28, 2023 – A GOP plan for the census would revive Trump’s failed push for a citizenship question
- CivilRights.org, Meeta Anand, September 18, 2024 – Project 2025 and the Census: Ghosts of Past, Present, and Future
- Coalition of Human Needs, David Elliott, August 28, 2024 – What Project 2025 Has In Store For The Census Bureau
- The Thurgood Marshall Institute – Project 2025 Will Limit Black Communities’ Political Participation
Leave a Reply