Donald Trump’s catering to his racist fanbase has led to his administration violating policies and procedures around how even the U.S. Census, which has never before been controversial, is conducted. On Wednesday, House Democrats did what they could to stop him.
A Democrat-led House subcommittee will vote Friday on a bill that would block the 2020 census from asking people about their citizenship status and prohibit quotas to force judges to move faster on immigration cases https://t.co/SN5Li3FNv5 pic.twitter.com/HMaxqqmdlG
— CNN (@CNN) May 16, 2019
On Wednesday, a bill to block Trump’s administration from adding a question on the census regarding a respondent’s citizenship status will move forward for a full vote on Friday. The question has been the subject of much debate, with supporters saying that it’s an important detail and detractors saying it’s simply a way of misusing the census to target immigrants.
CNN reports that:
‘A Democrat-led House subcommittee will vote Friday on a bill that would block the 2020 census from asking people about their citizenship status and prohibit the Justice Department from using quotas to force judges to move faster on immigration cases.
‘The provisions are a long way from reaching President Donald Trump’s desk and are unlikely to survive scrutiny by Senate Republicans and the White House. But their presence is a sign of how House Democrats are using their new majority power to try and block or influence administration policy.’
House Democrats moving bill to block census citizenship question @CNNPolitics https://t.co/rMzE6fZ1XK #atlcount2020 @atlcounts2020 #census2020 #keepinghopealive
— ATLCounts2020 (@AtlCounts2020) May 20, 2019
Since Mitch McConnell has declared himself the “Grim Reaper” of the Senate, ready to kill off any bill that the elected, Democratic members of the House of Representatives voted through, it’s unlikely that the bill will ever go past a vote on Friday. More than likely, it will sit in limbo while McConnell fails to do his job and obstructs legislative procedures.
‘Critics of the citizenship question say it will lead to a decline in the number of people responding to the census, resulting in an undercount of minority communities and therefore the allocation of congressional seats and the distribution of billions of federal dollars to states and localities.’
NEW: House Dems led by @RepJoseSerrano & Rep. @NitaLowey release new funding bill for #2020Census that wouldn't fund adding "any question that was not included in the 2018 End-to-End Census Test" (i.e., #CitizenshipQuestion the Trump admin wants to add)?https://t.co/q3OD80driz pic.twitter.com/N2O5Gd2lHL
— Hansi Lo Wang (@hansilowang) May 16, 2019
However, this is one issue that Republicans cannot simply dodge forever. The Supreme Court is set to hear legal arguments against adding the question in 2020, and opponents are ready with arguments that the presidential administration plans to add it illegally.
‘The Supreme Court is currently debating whether or not the Trump administration is allowed to include the citizenship question in a lawsuit on procedural grounds. Challengers, including 18 states, say Commerce Secretary William Ross violated the federal law that governs the way that agencies can propose and establish regulations. Lower courts have ruled against the administration.’
A couple notable riders in the House Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill:
1. No citizenship question in the 2020 Census
2. No quotas for immigration judges— Jack Fitzpatrick ☘️ (@jackfitzdc) May 16, 2019
Featured image via Flickr by Nancy Pelosi under a Creative Commons license
