Trump’s census citizenship fight kept heading toward the rocks
The administration’s push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census was still alive on April 17, but it was looking less like a policy and more like a long, expensive court slog. Judges had already blocked the move once, and the government’s rationale remained under intense scrutiny. The real embarrassment was that the White House kept trying to dress up a partisan tactic as neutral administration practice.
First recorded Apr 17, 2019·Meaningfully updated Apr 19, 2019
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What changed
The citizenship-question fight kept showing how badly the census gambit was going
The Trump administration’s attempt to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census remained in legal trouble and politically radioactive. By April 19, the effort was looking less like a policy choice and more like a bruising example of how to turn a census fight into a constitutional mess. The backlash centered on the obvious suspicion that the move was designed to depress participation and distort political power.
The Trump administration’s attempt to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census remained in legal trouble and politically radioactive. By April 19, the effort was looking less like a policy choice and more like a bruising example of how to turn a census fight into a constitutional mess. The backlash centered on the obvious suspicion that the move was designed to depress participation and distort political power.
The administration’s push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census was still alive on April 17, but it was looking less like a policy and more like a long, expensive court slog. Judges had already blocked the move once, and the government’s rationale remained under intense scrutiny. The real embarrassment was that the White House kept trying to dress up a partisan tactic as neutral administration practice.
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