Time for oral argument in the case challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to exclude undocumented immigrants from the apportionment base. #2020Census
Roberts starts off by noting that SCOTUS expedited the case based on the understanding that a decision was needed by 12/31 to enable the Census Bureau to meet statutory deadlines. Asks if that deadline is still operative. #2020Census
Acting SG Jeffrey Wall says the Census Bureau is not on track to meet 12/31 deadline because of delays but holds out the possibility that some data might be available in January (i.e., before Biden takes office). #2020Census
Wall’s argument overall is that the case is not ripe because we don’t yet know how many undocumented people, if any, the Census Bureau will be able identify and whether that will make a difference in congressional apportionment (i.e., don’t reach the merits). #2020Census
Breyer wants to get into the merits, however. Asks if law prohibits the President from excluding undocumented people from the census, why isn’t requesting the info wrong/illegal? #2020Census
Alito presses Wall on whether it is really realistic that the Bureau will be able to identify with any certainty the 10 million plus undocumented immigrants by end of December.
Wall concedes that is unlikely but can’t say how large number will be. #2020Census
Alito is skeptical. Asks how could any apportionment be valid if Bureau is only able to ascertain the legal status of only a portion of the population and only those people are excluded. #2020Census
On questioning from Sotomayor, Wall concedes that it is unlikely that the number of undocumented immigrants able to be identified by the Bureau would affect apportionment. #2020Census
Wall’s answers very carefully trying to avoid getting to the merits of the case by suggesting the President might not be excluding very many people from the apportionment base. The argument being that the court shouldn’t take up the merits unless the number is large. #2020Census
Barrett gets into the merits asking Wall whether the President’s desire to exclude undocumented immigrants from the apportionment base would go against long accepted practices. #2020Census
Wall tries to argue that presidents always had the discretion to exclude undocumented persons but just didn’t. Barrett sounds skeptical. #2020Census
On to New York SG Barbara Underwood, arguing for the challenging states. #2020Census
Aside: I am really glad not to have had to get up at 4:00 a.m. to go to this argument. #2020Census
Gorsuch asking Underwood question about whether harm to states is speculative at this point given uncertainty about how many people would be excluded. #2020Census
Gorsuch’s question getting at whether states have standing. Underwood pushes back on Gorsuch’s assumption that number could be nominal. #2020Census
Barrett’s questioning suggests that she doesn’t want to punt on standing. #2020Census
In his time, Dale Ho from the ACLU argues that the Trump policy is to exclude all undocumented immigrants and that is enough to give standing. Court should rule on that policy, not some hypothetical smaller exclusion. #2020Census
In his rebuttal, Wall argues simultaneously that the case is not ripe but also that the government should win because the President clearly can exclude at least some categories of undocumented immigrants. #2020Census
But plainly the Trump administration in the main is going for the narrowest of ‘wins,’ a decision that the case - that *they* wanted expedited - is premature. 🤷🏻♂️
In any event, given that the apportionment numbers now look like they may not come out until after 1/20, this case could very quickly become moot - though Wall tied to hold out the possibility that the President could get apportionment numbers before Inauguration Day. #2020Census
Aside: It probably won’t, but SCOTUS also could just sit on the census case until after 1/20 and then rule - in which the decision would be in ‘New York v. Biden’ rather than ‘New York v. Trump.’
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Barack Obama talks about the “idea of America” in his book and about not being ready to give up on it - and about the need of the world for the idea. I’ve been thinking about that. 1/
I don’t think there is any question that the United States has played an outsized role over the last 200+ years - from the very outset of the Republic, it has been an inspiration for the idea of self government (even if that idea was never perfectly realized). 2/
But ultimately the question it seems to me isn’t whether “idea of America” survives. 3/
A few years back when I read Christopher Hedges’ “War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning” - which is about the war spirit that envelops and takes over societies in a war - I immediately thought of politics, where something similar happens. 1/
Most anyone who has worked on a campaign has at some point experienced a version of this - where you come to believe that your opponent is capable of anything. Stealing yard signs, violating norms, etc. 2/
Worse, in that war-like moment, it’s easy to get lulled into conspiracy theories. And it’s easy to get pulled into really hating the other side. 3/
Having watched a fair amount of political coverage this cycle, one thing that stands out is how few Latino commentators & analysts there were (ditto Asians - but the Latino absence is particularly notable). 1/
To be sure, there were occasional Latino/-a operatives or activists on as guests. But not many - and mostly from Florida.
And really no regular analysts or commentators or reporters with deep experience with the Latino community or issues. 2/
Given the increased diversity of the country, it seems like a huge miss and blind spot - and something to do better on for 2024 because the country is only going to get more diverse. Increased diversity, in fact, is one of the giant stories of this decade. 3/
Kamala Harris won’t be the first VPOTUS born after the Immigration Nationality Act of 1965 (she was born in 1964).
But nonetheless this feels like a milestone in many ways - the beginning of the political coming of age for the diverse post-1965 generation. #Election2020
And not just for Democrats - I suspect Nikki Haley - a true child of the 1965 Immigration Act - will run for president in 2024 and that you will see children and grandchildren of the post-1965 wave of immigrants start to make their mark in many political areas. #Election2020
(Yes, yes, I know there was Bobby Jindal but he kind of haplessly flamed out early)
A term for #ElectionNight: "Dummymander" - a gerrymander that fails because of demographic or political changes (or both) not expected by the mapdrawer, something we're likely to see a fair bit of tonight in places like Texas. #txlege#fairmaps#Election2020
To be clear, this decade's TX gerrymander was pretty durable, successfully locking out Ds for most of the decade after 2011. But Texas is growing so fast & becoming more diverse so fast, it started failing in 2018. #txlege#fairmaps#Election2020
In the TX House, Rs drew a map to try to lock in a supermajority of 101 seats, which required spreading R voters among a lot of districts. Now, there's a good chance they will lose control of the chamber as a result of demographic & political shifts. #txlege#Election2020
A look at Texas turnout by county crossed against the number of registered voters. The suburban counties clearly show up as rocking it this year & there is also strong performance in the big urban counties. But a lot of variation for smaller counties. #txlege#Election2020
Oh, the outlier with super high turnout? That's McCulloch Co. in the Edwards Plateau, which the Texas SoS has at 92.5% turnout (not sure if that is a data error or if they are just really pumped). #txlege#Election2020
The state's lowest turnout as of the end of early voting is Hudspeth Co. in West Texas near El Paso, where just 26.8% of voters have voted. #txlege#Election2020