Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee are urging Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wis., to hold a hearing on the census in the wake of the Trump administration’s decision to add a citizenship question.
Sens. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., Kamala Harris, D-Calif., Tom Carper, D-Del., and Gary Peters, D-Mich., sent a letter to Johnson on Friday asking him to schedule a hearing “at the soonest time possible.”
The senators want Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to testify.
“We are deeply concerned about the recent announcement by the Commerce Department that it plans to add a new question to the 2020 Census that will ask respondents about their citizenship,” the group of senators wrote. “We also remain concerned by well-documented management and operational challenges facing the Census Bureau. Together, these problems risk a substantial undercount of persons in the 2020 Census with wide ranging implications for proportional representation in Congress, state government share of federal dollars, the accuracy of information businesses use to decide where to locate, the availability of affordable broadband service, and natural disaster funding.”
The Commerce Department announced Monday it will add a citizenship question to the decennial Census. The Trump administration said the additional question will lead to better enforcement of the Voting Rights Act.
But the Democratic senators said they were “concerned that the addition of the citizenship question is tainted by improper political considerations.”
“It is essential that Secretary Ross — who previously articulated concerns both to this committee and the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform about public trust and risks of reduced response rates from adding untested questions — fully explain: the processes, testing, and analysis behind the addition of the citizenship question, and the question’s impact on ongoing 2020 planning and preparations, particularly related to efforts to reach diverse communities,” the senators wrote.
After the Trump administration’s announcement, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra filed a lawsuit challenging the addition of the citizenship question. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is also leading a coalition of at least 12 states in a lawsuit against the administration over the citizenship question.
