Trial on citizenship issues could begin before midterm elections: NPR

Newly sworn American citizens gather for a naturalization ceremony in August in Alexandria, Virginia. A potential essay on a new citizenship question from the 2020 census is scheduled to begin November 5 in New York.

Claire Harbage / NPR

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Claire Harbage / NPR

Newly sworn American citizens gather for a naturalization ceremony in August in Alexandria, Virginia. A potential essay on a new citizenship question from the 2020 census is scheduled to begin November 5 in New York.

Claire Harbage / NPR

The first potentially controversial trial of the six citizenship lawsuits in the 2020 census could begin the day before voters go to the polls for the upcoming mid-term elections.

At a federal court hearing in Manhattan on Friday, US District Judge Jesse Furman set the tentative start date of Nov. 5, adding that his "strong instinct" is that the two cases.

Potential trials for both California cases and one of Maryland's cases are expected to begin in January. Decisions of district court judges should be appealed to higher courts. This could extend this legal battle in the final months of preparation for the 2020 census.

New York and more than two dozen states and cities, as well as other groups, are suing the Census Bureau and the Commerce Department, which oversees the office, over the decision made in March by the secretary from the State to Trade, Wilbur Ross, the upcoming national workforce.

The controversial issue

Ross said he approved the addition of the question – which asks, "Is this person a citizen of the United States?" – so that the Ministry of Justice can use the answers to better apply the provisions of Article 2 of the Law on the right to vote against discrimination of racial and linguistic minorities. The federal government has relied on estimates of citizens of voting age drawn from a sample survey known today as the American Community Survey to enforce this rights law. since its promulgation in 1965.

The chief scientist of the Census Bureau and other researchers have cautioned against adding the question of citizenship to the census. They cite research that suggests asking questions about citizen status in the current political climate of anti-immigrant rhetoric and strengthening the application of immigration under the Trump administration could discourage non-citizens from participating in the census .

The results of the focus groups conducted by the advertising agency Young & Rubicam for the 2020 Census marketing campaign indicate that the issue could complicate the Census Bureau's awareness of certain groups. A slide for an internal presentation at the office "A number of focus group participants responded negatively to the addition of citizenship, including Spanish (American continent) and Vietnamese, Chinese, [Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander]and the members of the woman [Middle Eastern or North African] group."

The constitution requires the government to count every ten years of all people living in the country – regardless of citizenship status – in order to produce population figures used to redistribute congressional seats and interstate ballots.

The complainants want the citizenship status question – which the Census Bureau has not asked all US households since 1950 – to be removed to avoid under-enumeration of people living in households with non-citizens, including unauthorized immigrants. That would affect the allocation of federal funds, estimated at $ 800 billion a year, based on population numbers.

Ignore a test?

During Friday's hearing, justice attorney Kate Bailey said the Trump administration did not want to go to trial because she felt Furman's Judge had already released "more than enough information".

In the past three months, the Trump administration has published thousands of pages of internal emails, memos and other documents to explain Ross' decision to add the question. Census Bureau and Commerce officials were also confronted with questioning hours by plaintiffs' lawyers.

Elena Goldstein, a lawyer from the Attorney General's Office in New York State, recoiled at Friday's hearing, calling a lawsuit "the most effective and logical way" given the differences between the two. complainants and the Trump administration. and why Ross added it to the 2020 census.

Furman JA said he was "skeptical" of not going to trial for summary judgment, but he is open to reviewing the Trump administration 's argument.

The publication of more documents

The hearing did not determine whether two key officials of the Trump administration involved in the citizenship issue would be filed for the prosecution.

The 2nd US Court of Appeals reviews the administration's request to block the testimony of John Gore, the acting head of the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division. This division would need answers to questions of citizenship to enforce the law on the right to vote. Justice Department lawyers say they are willing to ask the superior court to block Ross's testimony, which the plaintiffs asked Furman to authorize.

On Friday, Furman said the Trump administration was to issue unredacted versions of previously published internal documents which, he said, "go to the heart" of why Ross decided to add the citizenship issue. These documents are due to the complainants by Monday.