Justice Department refused to prosecute Wilbur Ross for testifying on census citizenship issue

The Justice Department has refused to prosecute former Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross despite a watchdog who concluded that the multimillionaire Republican made false statements to Congress about his agency’s motives for seeking to add a question of citizenship in the decennial census.

Peggy Gustafson, the Commerce Department’s Inspector General, revealed the DOJ’s refusal to take the case in a letter released Monday to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., and Representative Carolyn Maloney , DN.Y., who chairs the House Oversight Committee.

The letter says Gustafson’s office determined that Ross did not provide Congress with all of the reasons the Commerce Department sought to add the citizenship question to the census. The investigation was “presented and refused for prosecution by the public integrity section of the criminal division of the Department of Justice,” Gustafson wrote.

The Supreme Court ultimately dismissed then-President Donald Trump’s effort to add a citizenship question to the census in a 2019 ruling that found Ross’s reasons for doing so were in fact a pretext .

The issue of citizenship, which was contested by activists who said it would discourage minority participation in the constitutionally mandated count, did not appear in the 2020 census.

Ross asserted that the citizenship issue was necessary to enforce the Voting Rights Act. The former steel magnate said the Commerce Department sought to add the question in response to a request to do so by the Justice Department.

Gustafson questioned Ross’s claims in his letter to Schumer and Maloney.

Gustafson wrote in his letter that the Inspector General’s office investigated allegations that Trump administration officials withheld the work of a political agent who sought to add the question to the census.

This political agent is not named in the letter but appears to be Thomas Hofeller, a Republican strategist who conducted a study showing that adding a citizenship question could boost the GOP’s gerrymandering efforts. Hofeller died in 2018, and his records were made public after being discovered by his estranged daughter.

The watchdog also investigated whether officials deliberately withheld racial and partisan motives for adding the issue, Gustafson said.

Gustafson wrote that the Inspector General was unable to establish that Hofeller played a significant role in public policy.

The investigation showed that correspondence from the Department of Commerce to the Department of Justice contained “verbiage similar to that used in parts” of Hofeller’s unpublished study. But, she wrote, these parts “tied historical and factual references to the census and did not include the views of the political strategist.”

However, the investigation determined that Ross did not provide Congress with the Commerce Department’s motivations for asking the citizenship question on at least two occasions in March 2018, during testimony before two House committees. .

Ross testified that the Commerce Department’s decision to ask for the citizenship issue was based “solely on an application from DOJ” signed on December 12, 2017, Gustafson wrote.

“However, the evidence shows that there were significant communications related to the citizenship issue between the then secretary, his staff and other government officials between March 2017 and September 2017, which was long before the DOJ memorandum of request, “Gustafson wrote.

Further, she wrote that in a June 2018 memorandum, Ross “said he began reviewing the content of the 2020 census, including reinstating the citizenship question, shortly after his appointment to the secretary’s post “.

Gustafson added that there was also evidence to suggest the Commerce Department played a role in drafting the Justice Department memorandum.

The letter says the Inspector General’s investigation began in June 2019, but it does not say when the investigation ended, or when the Justice Department denied the prosecution. The letter is dated July 15.

Ross could not immediately be reached for comment. The Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment.

The letter says some lawmakers have received a more detailed report on the Inspector General’s findings. This report has not been redacted for public release, according to the letter.