NEW: Emails show career officials at the Census Bureau tried to warn the Trump admin that cutting the #2020Census schedule short would lead to "fatal data quality flaws that are unacceptable" and risked the perception of "politically-manipulated results." npr.org/2020/09/20/914…
2. These internal emails, memos and other docs were released this weekend as part of the Nat'l Urban League-led lawsuit in California over the shortened #2020Census schedule. They show career officials trying to hold the integrity of the census together in the last weeks of July.
3. I started this thread earlier this weekend with some highlights from what I found in the documents. Stand by for more #2020Census receipts...
4. On 7/21, 2 career officials, Kathleen Styles & Ben Page, began circulating separate draft documents with others at Census Bureau that tried to put plainly, as Styles wrote in this email, "why we need every minute of the requested schedule extension." assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
5. The internal document by Ben Page, the Census Bureau's chief financial officer, emphasized that additional time to review the #2020Census results is "essential to ensuring an accurate and complete count" especially in light of delays caused by COVID-19: assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
6. This 7/21 version of an "Elevator Speech" first drafted by Kathleen Styles, the Census Bureau's chief of 2020 census communications and stakeholder relations, warns: "Curtailing census operations will result in a census that is of unacceptable quality" assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
8. From 7/23 version of "Elevator Speech": "Shortening the time period to meet the original statutory deadlines ... will result in a census that has fatal data quality flaws that are unacceptable for a Constitutionally-mandated national activity." assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
9. By July 20, the Census Bureau's public position had become so uncertain that Chief Financial Officer Ben Page was not sure how to answer questions from leaders in Congress about whether the agency still needed #2020Census reporting deadlines changed: documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
10. Career bureau officials tried to prepare Census Bureau Director Steven Dillingham, a Trump appointee, to convey need for deadline extensions to lawmakers during a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing on 7/29. A key slide from prep materials: documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
11. That's not how the Census Bureau director's testimony before the House oversight committee on 7/29 turned out. My earlier thread:
12. The day after the House hearing, Census Bureau's senior managers learned Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, a Trump appointee who oversees bureau, wanted a formalized plan for shortening the #2020Census by 8/3. That was also the day I broke this story: npr.org/2020/07/30/896…
13. Career officials at Census Bureau managed to flesh out a new plan for a shortened #2020Census schedule despite their recommendations against doing so. Michael Thieme, an asst director in charge of #2020Census systems & contracts, noted the "great work under high pressure."
14. "The whole effort was excellent. Now I just wish it were for a more positive situation than what we're facing," Michael Thieme wrote after career officials at Census Bureau cobbled together a plan for a shortened #2020Census that Trump admin wanted. documentcloud.org/documents/7213…
15. There are a lot of twists and turns in how the Trump administration shortened the #2020Census schedule (and I'm preparing to learn more from the next document dumps). In the meantime, I've updated this timeline to help catch you up: npr.org/2020/09/18/911…
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A controversial Census Bureau proposal could shrink the rate of disability in the U.S. by about 40%. Public comments on this potential change are due Tuesday, Dec. 19, but NPR has confirmed there will be another opportunity to give feedback in the spring… npr.org/2023/12/18/121…
2. Public comments on these proposed changes to the disability questions on the American Community Survey can be emailed to acso.pra@census.gov. The bureau tells NPR they are set to be published here before the next public comment period in the spring: regulations.gov/document/USBC-…
3. The bureau says the proposed changes are part of a years-long effort to improve the quality of its disability data and standardize the statistics so they're comparable to other countries' numbers npr.org/2023/12/18/121…
The Supreme Court could upend how federal elections are run across the U.S. if it adopts even a limited version of a once-fringe idea called the "independent state legislature theory."
I wrote about what could happen after SCOTUS rules on Moore v. Harper: npr.org/2023/01/22/114…
A Supreme Court ruling that adopts some version of the “independent state legislature theory” could lead to more lawsuits and bring uncertainty to upcoming elections npr.org/2023/01/22/114…
A Supreme Court ruling that adopts some version of the “independent state legislature theory” could make it easier for state lawmakers to ignore voting rights protected under state law npr.org/2023/01/22/114…
I wrote about a push for the U.S. Supreme Court to change who counts as Black in redistricting.
Republican officials in Louisiana want a narrower definition of Blackness that excludes some Black people & could minimize Black voting power around the U.S. npr.org/2022/10/18/112…
2. A 2003 ruling by SCOTUS after the 2000 census — the first U.S. head count that allowed people to identify with more than one race — set a standard definition of "Black" for voting rights cases focused exclusively on the voting power of Black people. npr.org/2022/10/18/112…
3. That definition of "Black" has included everyone who identifies as Black for the census — including people who mark the boxes for Black and any other racial/ethnic category such as white, Asian & Hispanic/Latino, which federal gov't says is an ethnicity npr.org/2022/10/18/112…
SCOOP: Former President Donald Trump's payroll tax delay last year left a $7 million accounting mess for the Census Bureau, which has been trying to get ~28K former census workers to pay off their debt after giving up trying to collect from ~148K others npr.org/2021/11/05/104…
2. I deleted this earlier tweet that misstated the number of former 2020 census workers from whom the Census Bureau has decided to stop trying to collect unpaid payroll taxes. That number is 147,619 former workers (not ~178K):
3. The Census Bureau was one of many fed agencies the Trump admin directed last year to stop collecting some employees' share of a payroll tax that helps fund Social Security. Trump said it would get "bigger paychecks for working families.” But it’s also an accounting challenge.
I asked the office of Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla. — who blocked an attempt to confirm Census Bureau director nominee Robert Santos by unanimous consent in October — why Scott said he's concerned Santos will “politicize" the bureau & not serve "in a fair and unbiased fashion"...
2. So far, Scott's office has not provided any evidence that would suggest Santos would “politicize” the Census Bureau and “not perform his duties in a fair and unbiased fashion."
Instead, Scott's communications director, McKinley Lewis, gave this statement by email:
3. I am waiting for any direct response to this follow-up question:
Does Sen. Rick Scott consider Robert Santos not qualified or competent to serve as Census Bureau director? If so, why?
NEW: The 2020 census likely undercounted people of color at rates higher than those of the last count, an @urbaninstitute study finds. That could translate into inequities in political representation & federal funding across the U.S. for the next 10 years npr.org/2021/11/02/104…
@urbaninstitute 2. Important to note: This @urbaninstitute study is *not* an analysis of 2020 census results & doesn't show actual over/undercounts. The estimates are based on a *simulated* census & a method for measuring accuracy that's different from the Census Bureau's urban.org/research/publi…
@urbaninstitute 3. Let's also keep in mind: When people of color are undercounted in the census, it's not just "some" groups who miss out on federal funding and political representation — it's *everyone* living in the local communities and states where there are people of color.