Rules of the Court of Appeal: Wilbur Ross must testify: NPR

A panel of three judges from the second US federal court of appeal dismissed the Trump administration's action to prevent the Commerce Secretary, Wilbur Ross, from sitting for an interrogation under oath in the context of numerous lawsuits across the country following his decision to add a question about US citizenship status to the 2020 census.

But the judges temporarily suspended Ross' s testimony on October 11 to allow the administration or the plaintiffs "to seek redress from the Supreme Court," according to an order issued on Tuesday.

The 2nd Circuit's order came as Trump administration lawyers struggled at the last minute to prevent Ross and another key official on the citizenship issue – Justice Department official John Gore – having to testify amicably in the two major lawsuits in New York. The collection of evidence for both trials is scheduled to end this week.

The ruling confirms an earlier decision by US District Judge Jesse Furman, who wrote: "Secretary Ross must sit for a deposition because, among other things, his intent and credibility are directly involved in these cases."

Lawyers for dozens of states, cities, and organizations suing the Trump administration were asked questions to Ross on Thursday, the day after their dismissal from Gore. Gore heads the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division which, according to the administration, needs answers to the citizenship question to better enforce the protections provided in the Voting Rights Act against discrimination of racial and linguistic minorities .

The Trump administration is expected to appeal the decision rendered by the 2nd Circuit on Tuesday to the Supreme Court. Last week, Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg rejected the administration's request that the High Court temporarily suspend the depositions and requests for internal documents related to the lawsuits, while leaving the door open to the court. The administration to ask the court to block them permanently.

All this back and forth legal announcements up to the beginning of the first potential trial on the citizenship issue, which is scheduled to begin November 5, the eve of the mid-term elections, at the US District Court for the Southern. New York District.

Ross added that he had added the question so that the Department of Justice could use the citizenship information to better apply Article 2 of the Voting Rights Act. But the plaintiffs argue that the federal government does not need the 2020 census to collect citizenship data in order to enforce section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. Since the coming into force of the law in 1965, the government has relied on estimates of the number of citizens of voting age from a Census Bureau survey, now known as the American Community Survey.

More than two dozen states and cities, as well as other groups, have taken legal action to get the issue of citizenship removed from the forms for the next national count. Citing Census Bureau research, they fear that asking the question of citizenship status in the current political climate discourages households of non-citizens from participating in the census.

In their complaints, the complainants say that Ross' s decision to add the issue constituted a misuse of his discretion with respect to the census as head of the commerce department. They also allege that the Trump administration's pressure on the issue discriminated against immigrant communities of color.

The Census Bureau has not interviewed all households in the country on the status of citizenship since 1950.

Democrats in the Senate and House of Representatives have asked Ross to return to Capitol Hill to testify on the citizenship issue after internal memos and e-mails from the prosecution contradicted Ross's previous testimonies. Before announcing the addition of the citizenship issue in March, Ross told lawmakers that the Department of Justice had "launched" the request. When asked if the White House had asked him to add a question on citizenship, Mr. Ross said at a hearing in the House: "We only answer that question." at the request of the Ministry of Justice. "

In June, however, in a memo filed as part of the lawsuit, Ross had begun to consider adding the question to the 2020 census "shortly after" the assumption of responsibility. Commerce Department in February 2017; the Department of Justice sent its official request to the Census Bureau later that year in December. Ross also noted that "other senior government officials had already raised" the issue of a citizenship issue.