States fear ’20 census undercount
Question on citizenship has officials concerned
LOS ANGELES — In a squat office building not far from downtown, Esperanza Guevara is getting ready to look for people who might not want to be found. And her job could get a lot harder.
The immigrant-rights activist is leading a drive to reach tens of thousands of people who entered the
U.S. illegally and persuade them to participate in the 2020 census.
The Trump administration’s plan to use the census to inquire about citizenship has sent a chill through immigrant communities. Guevara and others fear the question could discourage participation and, by some estimates, leave millions uncounted across the country.
An inaccurate count could have real-world consequences, since billions in federal dollars and seats in Congress are allocated according to population.
In immigrant communities often wary of government, a question about citizenship status will make people “less likely to fill out the census form or even answer the door when someone comes knocking,” said Guevara, who works for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles.
Census Bureau chief Ron Jarmin said the agency is legally barred from sharing its information with law enforcement agencies. “We are committed to ensuring that the data we collect are always protected.”
The U.S. Supreme Court is weighing a legal challenge seeking to strike the citizenship question from the census form.
The Public Policy Institute of California has said that failure to accurately tally immigrants and other hard-to-reach groups could lead to an undercount of 1.6 million people That would cost California one of its 53 House seats.
So California and other states are spending millions to persuade residents to fill out census forms.
Colorado’s House recently endorsed spending $12 million to encourage participation. The governors of Kansas and Nevada have moved to create committees devoted to making sure everyone takes part.
New Mexico has launched a multimillion-dollar effort to ensure an accurate tally. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has warned that a 1 percent undercount could translate into more than $700 million in lost federal revenue.