Democrats fear a citizenship Census question
This “new math could shift political representation towards eligible voters and away from the country’s overall population”
The usual suspects on the left are melting down because the U.S. Department of Commerce has reinstated the citizenship question to the 2020 census. You know the drill, this move is racist, xenophobic, tyrannical, and even, according to California’s attorney general, illegal.
The left is frantic because they are worried that illegal aliens will not fill out the 2020 census and as a result Democrat-held urban areas—where large numbers of illegals are concentrated—will lose out to more rural areas. Rural areas tend to be more conservative and to vote Republican.
California’s attorney general has announced he is filing suit over the reinstated question of citizenship.
#BREAKING: Filing suit against @realdonaldtrump's Administration over decision to add #citizenship question on #2020Census. Including the question is not just a bad idea — it is illegal: https://t.co/vW8sa7khq9
— Attorney General Becerra (@AGBecerra) March 27, 2018
Former Attorney General and presidential hopeful intent on “unifying the country” Eric Holder says that the question is intended to intimidate people (illegal aliens, presumably).
Constitution does not require citizenship question. This is purely political. Trump Administration is trying to rig the 2020 Census (to protect gerrymandering) by intimidating people. Don’t be fooled-some states will unfairly lose funds and representation. We will sue. https://t.co/2R3mZ0FQSp
— Eric Holder (@EricHolder) March 27, 2018
FiveThirtyEight has weighed in, too, stating that “new math could shift political representation towards eligible voters and away from the country’s overall population.” Apparently, political representation of eligible voters is a lunatic idea.
The problem for the left, of course, is that reinstating the citizenship question will do just that.
The Trump administration is being sued over its plans to include a question about citizenship in the 2020 Census, which California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D) says “is not just a bad idea — it is illegal.”
No, it’s not. There is nothing wrong with asking about citizenship. Canada asks a citizenship question on its census. So do Australia and many other U.S. allies. The U.S. government asked about citizenship for 130 years — from 1820 to 1950 — as part of the decennial “short form” census and continued to do so in the “long form” survey — distributed to 1 in 6 people — through 2000, when the long form was replaced by the annual American Community Survey. The ACS goes to about 2.6 percent of the population each year and asks about citizenship to this day.
So why are many on the left up in arms over a question that should be relatively uncontroversial? Answer: Money and power. Democrats are worried that adding a citizenship question will dampen participation in the census by illegal immigrants, reducing the total population count in the Democratic-leaning metropolitan areas where illegal immigrants are largely concentrated.
Because census data is used to determine the distribution of federal funds, that could decrease the cities’ share of more than $675 billion a year in federal funding. And because census data is also used to create and apportion congressional seats, Democrats fear that if illegal immigrants don’t participate it could shift power from Democratic cities to rural communities, which tend to vote Republican.
. . . . This is a losing issue for Democrats. They are effectively arguing that sanctuary cities should be rewarded with more federal money for interfering with the federal enforcement of our immigration laws and turning themselves into magnets for illegal immigrants.
And Democrats, who claim to be deeply concerned about foreign interference in our democracy, seem to have no problem with foreign interference when it comes to noncitizens in the United States illegally affecting the distribution of seats in Congress. If Democrats want to make that argument to the American people, go for it. It will further alienate millions of voters who abandoned the Democratic Party in the 2016 election.
The left ignores how failure to ask about citizenship hurts another of their key demographics: black people.
Let’s borrow the absurd rhetoric of the crazed Left for a moment: the status quo — not asking for citizenship data in the Census — is Jim Crow. Jim Crow hurts black political power, and so does a lack of solid citizenship data in the decennial census.
Here’s how.
In many urban areas, blacks compete with Hispanics for local office, particularly in Democratic Party primaries. Miami, Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York City, and Chicago are places where local Democratic Party politics have deep African-American and Hispanic constituencies. In November, they are rock-solid Democrat voters to defeat Republicans. But in primaries, they often compete.
More importantly, the two groups also compete in line-drawing exercises, where districts are created for school board, county council, statehouse, and Congress. Racial line-drawing — an exercise compelled by the Voting Rights Act whether you like it or not — is reality. Racial line-drawing relies on census data, and each district must have essentially equal population under existing law.
This line drawing counts non-citizen Hispanics to generate Hispanic-majority districts with the minimum total population (citizen and non-citizen combined). But blacks have to ride in the back of the redistricting bus, because they are almost all citizens.
That’s where Trump’s Census change could revolutionize the dynamics of line-drawing in urban communities where blacks and Hispanics have concentrated populations.
This conundrum highlights a very real problem for Democrats. They are so invested in identity politics that it’s inevitable that policies advocating one of their favored groups will harm another (often many others). They just hope that no one notices.
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Comments
A smart move on PDJT’s part. The Dems are beating themselves up with big sticks over this decision, and although it won’t change the minds of any of the dedicated leftists, the moderates and conservatives can see right through the Dems’ squawking.
Republican strategy pre-Trump: Try not to say anything stupid.
Republican strategy in the age of Trump: Try to make your opponents say the dumbest things possible and laugh at them.
Try to make your opponents say the dumbest things possible and laugh at them.
Which accomplishes nothing.
Since nothing is too ridiculous for the Left, ridicule is ineffective. It may cheer some on the Right a bit as Western civilization drowns in a flood of institutional silliness, but they will drown nevertheless.
Shift the Overton Window.
Proposed Question: “are you loyal to the United States of America”
Democrats: “hey, how about we just ask if their citizens?”
I want to laugh every time Hillary fails to understand why she lost the election, but then I remember that Establishment Republicans have been doing that the last two decades
Plus, last time those GOPe voted for Hillary.
Hey, we’ve seen them bragging about voting for Hillary!
No Eric Holder, you lying asshole, standing in front of a polling place with a billy club is meant to intimidate people. Won’t you shut the fuck up and go away?
On the census questionnaire, they ask many strange questions, like racial and sexual identity and “How many bathrooms do you have in your house?” If they can ask those kinds of questions, then they can certainly ask about citizenship, which is one of the most obvious census questions.
Why are the left so Xenomaniacal? Why do they believe we should give away our country for them to gain power?
Yes. Next question.
Rotten boroughs are no joke and we’ve been allowing it for decades. Unless of course the dems intend for the illegals to vote…
“This “new math could shift political representation towards eligible voters and away from the country’s overall population”
OH THE HORROR! only “eligible voters” would receive political representation? The world must be ending soon! /eyeroll
This also leaves out another large DemocRAT voting block. The dead. We all know much the Dems rely on how many graveyards open up each election day to make sure they win. The dead are more reliable than a car trunk full of extra ballots. Ala Al Franken.
If you want to shut the left up about this just point out that their arguments are essentially the same as the ones used to justify the three-fifths compromise. They want to count a population which cannot vote so that they are apportioned more representatives and have more political power.
Democrats never change. They are just too historically illiterate realize it.
That’s it in a nutshell, isn’t it. Foreign interference is fine, as long as it helps the Democrats.
I would note that it would be possibly embarrassing if say a precinct had more Democrat votes than the Census shows it has citizens of voting age. Not that the Republicans would protest about it, but it might be noted by a few people.
1. Asking about citizenship is OBVIOUSLY legal, and only a dishonest judge could possible rule otherwise. No, it’s not required by the constitution, but nor are any of the other questions asked. As OldProf2 points out, if the census can ask about bathrooms, why on earth should it not ask about citizenship, or height, or any other irrelevant question?
2. And this is a point many people on the correct side of the question consistently miss: The Democrats do have a point here, just not a winning one. Shifting political representation towards eligible voters and away from the country’s overall population is indeed wrong. The constitution explicitly requires the opposite. Representation is to be based on the entire population, not on eligible voters. It doesn’t matter whether you think this is a good idea; it’s the supreme law of the land.
3. But you know what? I won’t shed any tears if this law is inadvertently not completely fulfilled because certain people voluntarily chose not to reply to the census. I purposely ignore the census anyway, precisely because I want my area and my state to be undercounted and lose representation. The constitution requires the government to try to count me; it doesn’t require me to play along. So if including a perfectly legal and valid question on the form causes some of my neighbors to make the same choice, I’m all for it. I don’t even see as a problem that the government predicts and expects this will happen. So long as it doesn’t knowingly exclude any individual from the census, it has done its duty.
4.
This is a dishonest argument, for two reasons. One, foreigners who are present in the USA are not foreign governments; they are not acting for their governments, and have every right to influence our elections in every way but voting. After all, they have to obey our laws, even though they get no vote in making them, so it’s even more important for them to be able to influence their voting neighbors. Two, by answering the census and being counted for representation they are not illegally affecting the distribution of seats in Congress; on the contrary, this is legally required. Deliberately not counting them would illegally affect the distribution of seats.
5.
Now this argument is just silly. It’s got things exactly opposite. If you draw a district where a majority of the population is Hispanic, but where a majority of eligible voters are black, you’ve actually helped the blacks and short-changed the Hispanics. Because on election day the blacks will elect their candidate and the Hispanics for whom this district was drawn will not be able to do anything about it.
Eric Holder is such a disgusting POS.
Not “required” by the Constitution?
Oh well.
Let’s make a list of everything is is NOT REQUIRED BY THE CONSTITUTION.
Let’s start:
– An income tax is NOT required by the Constitution.
– Food stamps are NOT required by the Constitution.
– A Department Of Education is NOT required by the Constitution.
– Sending billions to other countries is NOT required by the Constitution.
– Buying insurance is NOT required by the Constitution, neither is fining for not buying.
More?
The original, and only legitimate, purpose of a census is for apportioning congressional districts. Non-citizens have no right to vote, and should not be represented in Congress. If there are substantial numbers of them, they must be identified, and not be counted for purposes of apportionment.
You may wish it were so, but the constitution says the exact opposite, and it is the supreme law of the land. You are advocating blatantly violating the constitution, which is a whole lot worse than anything illegal immigrants have done.
You’re an liar and/or a fool. The Constitution originally specified that Indians not be counted, and slaves counted as 3/5 of a person, precisely for the reason of not giving representation to people who weren’t at that time citizens with voting rights. The Constitution is not unconstitutional.
Bullshit. You are lying through your f*cking teeth.
The constitution still excludes from the count those Indians who are not taxed. It originally also excluded 40% of the slaves, but since there are no more slaves that’s no longer relevant.
It also now excludes those male citizens who are over 21, not guilty of rebellion or other crime, but whom state law for some reason denies the right to vote. Which is nobody.
But other than those explicit exceptions it explicitly requires the apportionment to take into account the whole number of persons, regardless of citizenship, immigration status, criminal status, or anything else. It has never been the case that only citizens, or only those with voting rights, were to be represented. Anyone who claims otherwise is a liar.
The constitution still excludes from the count those Indians who are not taxed.
I forgot to add, “which is nobody”.
All three categories excluded from the count have zero members. Thus all persons in the USA on census night are to be counted.
Illiterate moron.
Yes, you are. And a liar. So why don’t you go away, or better still go drown yourself?
Well, here’s the original Constitution on House apportionment (Article 1, Section 2):
And here’s the text of the 14th Amendment regarding Article I, Section 2:
Exactly. Which is exactly what I wrote and Bisley denied.
If you can’t ask if someone is a citizen you shouldn’t be able to ask anything.