Census Bureau announces end to population count after Supreme Court action
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The U.S. Census Bureau ended its 2020 count Thursday after the U.S. Supreme Court allowed an end to data collection.
Ruling Tuesday, the Supreme Court stayed an order prolonging data collection until Oct. 31, report the New York Times (here and here) and the Washington Post.
The Census Bureau announced the end of the count in a press release that said it had accounted for 99.9% of housing units.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented.
“The government now claims that this court’s immediate intervention is necessary because, absent a stay, the bureau will not be able to meet the Dec. 31 statutory deadline for reporting census results to the president,” Sotomayor wrote. “This representation is contrary to the government’s repeated assertions to the courts below that it could not meet the statutory deadline under any circumstances. Moreover, meeting the deadline at the expense of the accuracy of the census is not a cost worth paying.”
The Census Bureau had initially set an extended Oct. 31 deadline because of disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, then sought to roll back that date to Sept. 30. The government had also rolled back plans to seek an extended deadline to report the results to President Donald Trump after he said the numbers should not include immigrants who are in the country illegally.
See also:
ABAJournal.com: “Afternoon Briefs: Trump sued over census policy excluding immigrants; judge swears in 37 new US citizens”
ABAJournal.com: “Census Bureau apparently pushing ahead with early deadline despite court order, judge says”
