Tag: Trump Commerce Department

As Supreme Court decision nears, lower court orders new look at census citizenship question

Washington Post logoA federal appeals court said Tuesday that a Maryland judge should examine new allegations that the Trump administration had a discriminatory intent in adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, on the eve of a possible Supreme Court decision on the matter.

The order was part of last-minute wrangling in the lower courts, in the Supreme Court and on Capitol Hill as the justices are set to vote on the issue before the end of their term, presumably this week.

The Supreme Court is considering lower-court decisions that said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross violated administrative law and the enumeration clause of the Constitution by proposing to ask the citizenship question of each household. Critics, even in the Census Bureau, say the question could cause an undercount of millions of people who would be afraid to return the form.

View the complete June 25 article by Robert Barnes, Felicia Sonmez and Tara Bahrampour on The Washington Post website here.

Commerce Dept. ordered ex-official not to answer House panel questions

A former senior Commerce Department official refused to answer more than 100 questions during an interview with the House Oversight and Reform Committee that centered on the Trump administration’s controversial decision to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, according to atranscript released Tuesday.

Commerce Department lawyers instructed James Uthmeier, who served as senior adviser and counsel to Secretary Wilbur Ross, not to answer the committee’s questions about his contacts with the White House and his conversations with Ross.

Uthmeier was also directed not to discuss the contents of a memo he wrote to a senior Justice Department official, John Gore, that purportedly outlines legal arguments surrounding the addition of a citizenship question to the census. On several occasions, Uthmeier was also blocked from disclosing details about his own conversations with Gore.

View the complete June 25 article by Andrew Desiderio on the Politico website here.

New evidence throws census citizenship case into question

New evidence about a Republican strategist’s role in adding a citizenship question to the 2020 census is putting increased pressure on the Supreme Court.

The justices are weighing whether the controversial question should be allowed on the census after opponents filed lawsuits arguing it would lead to an inaccurate population count. The Trump administration has countered that it’s needed to enforce the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

But documents first made public on Thursday appear to undermine the administration’s position. The court filings claim that late GOP redistricting strategist Thomas Hofeller played a substantial role in adding the citizenship question. The court documents also allege that Trump administration officials lied during testimony by not disclosing the strategist’s efforts.

View the complete June 2 article by Jacqueline Thomsen on The Hill website here.

A dead man just revealed the Trump administration’s plans to rig elections for white Republicans

They don’t believe in democracy.

A longtime Republican operative urged Trump administration officials to add a question to the 2020 census form that hasn’t been asked since the Jim Crow era, knowing full well that including this question “would clearly be a disadvantage to the Democrats” and “advantageous to Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites,” according to a document filed in federal court on Thursday.

The Trump administration did add the question, which asks whether census respondents are U.S. citizens, at the urging of Dr. Thomas Hofeller, a Republican master in the dark arts of political mapmaking who passed away last summer. It also produced documents which falsely claimed that the question would “ensure that the Latino community achieves full representation in redistricting.”

Last January, a federal court ordered the citizenship question removed from the census form, citing numerous violations of laws laying out the process the government must use if it wishes to change that form. Notably, Judge Jesse Furman wrote in his opinion striking down the citizenship question, the administration’s stated reason for adding the question “was pretextual” — that is, the administration said that it added the question to help protect voting rights, when it was really up to something else altogether.

View the complete May 30 article by Ian Millhiser on the ThinkProgress website here.

The Four Pinocchio claim at the center of the census citizenship question

The Trump administration’s move to add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census is coming up for oral argument at the Supreme Court on Tuesday. That means the justices could be weighing a Four-Pinocchio claim by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

Ross, who oversees the Census Bureau and approved the question last year, claimed in congressional testimony that the Justice Department “initiated the request for inclusion of the citizenship question.”

But, as part of this court case, emails were released showing that Ross was talking to top advisers to President Trump and maneuvering to add the citizenship question months before the Justice Department sent a letter in December 2017 with a formal request.

View the complete April 22 article by Salvador Rizzo on The Washington Post logo here.

House gets its say as Supreme Court takes up census citizenship question

Stakes are high as decision could affect how many House seats each state gets

The House gets a relatively rare chance to directly address the Supreme Court on Tuesday in a legal showdown about whether the Trump administration can add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

The case is one of the most significant for members of Congress during the current Supreme Court term. The census results determine how many House seats each state gets and affect how states redraw congressional districts. The results are also used to distribute billions of dollars from federal programs that are based on population count to state and local governments.

The House cited those reasons when it asked for time during oral argument. The lawmakers plan to argue that it is up to Congress to ensure an accurate count, and a federal law called the Census Act limits the discretion of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to add a question about whether each person being counted is a citizen.

View the complete April 22 article by Todd Ruger on The Roll Call website here.

Congressman Blasts Commerce Secretary For Deceit In Census Scheme

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross Credit: Manuel Balce Ceneta, AP

In a powerful moment, Rep. Lacy Clay (D-MO) slammed Trump Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross for “misleading Congress” and trying to steal political power from nonwhite Americans, and called on Ross to resign.

Ross testified Thursday before the House Oversight Committee about his role in adding a question about citizenship to the upcoming 2020 Census — a racist ploy by Republicans that would intimidate many undocumented immigrants out of participating in the survey. This would lead areas with larger minority populations to be undercounted in the census, which would deny those communities equal representation in Congress and equal access to federal funding.

Clay asked Ross if he would “take responsibility today for misleading Congress” when he testified under oath that the citizenship question was added “solely” based on a request from the Department of Justice in December 2017. But new documents and memos have surfaced showing that Ross was part of an administration discussion on the new question in April 2017.

View the complete March 14 article by Oliver Willis on the National Memo website here.

Wilbur Ross broke law, violated Constitution in census decision, judge rules

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross acted in “bad faith,” broke several laws and violated the constitutional underpinning of representative democracy when he added a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.

In finding a breach of the Constitution’s enumeration clause, which requires a census every 10 years to determine each state’s representation in Congress, the 126-page ruling by U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco went further than a similar decision on Jan. 15 by Judge Jesse Furman in New York.

The Supreme Court has already agreed to review Furman’s narrower decision, with arguments set for April 23, but may now need to expand its inquiry to constitutional dimensions.

View the complete March 6 article by Fred Barbash on The Washington Post website here.

Ethics Office Rebukes Commerce Secretary For Concealing Bank Stock

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross Credit: Manuel Balce Ceneta, AP

The Office of Government Ethics (OGE) refused to certify Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross’ financial disclosure form — because Ross lied about owning certain stocks.

The move comes after the OGE warned Ross in the summer of 2018 about the consequences of his repeated problems with inaccurate disclosures.

In a letter dated Feb. 15, 2019, OGE Director Emory A. Rounds declared that the office would not certify Ross’ disclosure because the “report was not accurate and he was not in compliance with his ethics agreement at the time of the report.”

View the complete February 19 article by Dan Desai Martin of the American Independent on the National Memo website here.

Supreme Court to hear census citizenship case this term

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to take up a case about the Trump administration’s plan to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

The justices decided to skip over a regional appeals court and review a district court ruling that bars the Trump administration from adding the controversial question to the decennial population count.

They granted the government’s request to hear arguments this term ahead of a ruling from the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. Arguments will be heard in the second week in April.

View the complete February 15 article by Lydia Wheeler on The Hill website here.