Today, Explained - 2020 makes no census

Episode Date: August 13, 2020

The 2020 census is fighting a losing battle against the coronavirus and President Trump. NPR’s Hansi Lo Wang explains how a decade of money and power are at stake. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Well, the census is really just a mess right now. It really is a mess. Hansi Lo Wang's been paying close attention to the census for NPR and, by my estimation, the country. There are a lot of challenges facing the census, including the pandemic, including a shortened counting period. And we're at a point right now where roughly four out of 10 households have not been counted yet nationwide. And these remaining households are what the Census Bureau considers the hardest to count in the country. These are predominantly folks from historically undercounted groups, groups that have high levels of mistrust of the government, distrust of the government, are very wary of participating and sharing their personal information, despite federal laws that

protect people's personal information, that is now being complicated by multiple attempts by the White House to make changes to how the census is conducted, there's no real direct comparison that can be made to any past count in U.S. history. So it sounds like, Hansi, we have these two major buckets of challenges facing the 2020 census. There's all the stuff related to the pandemic, and then there's the general President Trump and his administration challenging this count. So let's start with the pandemic. And then there's the general President Trump and his administration challenging this count. So let's start with the pandemic. How has the pandemic derailed the 2020 census? Well, counting was supposed to be done by now. Counting was supposed to end July 31st. That's when door knocking was supposed to have ended.

And really, the Census Bureau at this point, before the pandemic, was planning to really go through all the responses as collected and start the processing. All that has been delayed. Door knocking was pushed back for months because of the pandemic. It was impossible to send out door knockers to try to do in-person visits in any safe kind of way. And door knocking has only just started in some parts of the country. visits are really the way for the Census Bureau to make sure that historically underground groups, communities of color, renters, rural residents, folks who are less likely to fill out a census form on their own, that person-to-person interaction is the way to make sure that they are not missed in this once-a-decade count. And that effort is always a challenge because you're essentially trying to convince people to participate in something that they probably don't know about or don't want to

participate in. But now we're also trying to do that while keeping social distance, while overcoming people's fears of having strangers at their door in the middle of a pandemic. So who knows what's going to happen over the next few weeks, how feasible it will be in some parts of the country to do an on-the-ground, door-to-door effort. Have deadlines changed because of the pandemic? Are there extensions that will ensure a full count? Legal deadlines so far have not changed changed despite requests from the Census Bureau. Back in April, the Census Bureau, as well as Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who oversees the Census Bureau, he's an appointee of President Trump, and as well as President Trump, who spoke out

publicly about this, about a request to Congress to extend the legal reporting deadlines for the 2020 census results. Federal law says that by the end of this year, the Commerce Secretary has to present to the president the latest state population counts. Those are the numbers used to redistribute seats in Congress among the states. And the Census Bureau back in April said that at that point, they realized they can no longer meet that deadline. They need more time. And they asked for 120-day extension of that legal reporting deadline so that they can deliver those numbers next year in 2021. And that would allow them to reset their timeline and continue counting through October 31st.

Well, what's happened recently is that I broke the story. I talked to three Census Bureau employees. They didn't want to be identified because they feared losing their jobs, but they confirmed that the Census Bureau had recently decided to end door knocking at the end of September, a month earlier than they had announced. And then the Census Bureau confirmed that days later and said that not only door knocking would be ended earlier, but also the collection of responses online at my2020census.gov, through toll-free phone numbers, as well as through the mail. So all counting is going to end September 30th, the Census Bureau says. And this is all happening while there's this great uncertainty. There is a window here where Congress could pass a law, most likely through the next

coronavirus relief package, some provision that includes a deadline extension, which would theoretically allow the Census Bureau to keep counting past September 30th, another month, which is what the Census Bureau officials have said they need. More time, not less. This is very confusing, Hansi. So the count has been sort of ineffectual due to coronavirus. They agreed on asking for an extension and taking a little bit longer with this count. And then before Congress could even finalize it by working it into the stimulus package, they said, never mind, we'll end everything early. And all the while, this pandemic continues to rage across the country

and the door-to-door count hasn't even really taken off in earnest in a lot of places. This has been very tenuous planning. All these changes to the schedule have really been conditional, that the Census Bureau was essentially assuming that Congress would pass a law, and that because career officials, top officials at the Census Bureau have said as early as May that it is no longer possible for the Census Bureau to produce the latest state population counts by the end of this year, that these warnings are being made publicly. But Congress so far has not taken this up. Democrats have. They've introduced legislation, but Republicans have not. And so it's really unclear why the Census Bureau decided just recently was the moment that they had to essentially stop waiting and to end counting early.

Do you think there may have been some political interference from perhaps the Trump administration? You know, one thing to keep in mind is that what has also happened recently is that President Trump put out a presidential memo. And this memo calls for unauthorized immigrants to be excluded, not from the census in general, but specifically from those state population counts used to redistribute seats in Congress for the reapportionment process, despite the Constitution saying that the whole number of persons in each state should be counted once a decade in order to determine each state's share of congressional seats, seats in the House of Representatives. That memo is now out, and there are now multiple federal lawsuits I'm tracking trying to get that

memo blocked and to get it declared unconstitutional. We'll see how that plays out. But in the meantime, not extending the reporting deadlines for the 2020 census results means that even if President Trump does not win re-election, he will be the president to receive those latest state population counts at the end of this year. The same population count that President Trump has said through this memo that he wants to change by excluding unauthorized immigrants. And this is something that's never been done before? No, it has never been done before. Ever since the very first census back in 1790, the numbers used for reapportioning seats in Congress have included counts of both citizens and

non-citizens, regardless of immigration status. And one thing to keep in mind, the wording in the Constitution, even before the Constitution was amended by the 14th Amendment to require the whole number of persons to be counted, persons is a key word. There's no mention of citizens, for example. And President Trump may want to try to exclude unauthorized immigrants from the apportionment count, but experts I talk to say it's not possible to do that in any legal way because the 2020 census forms do not include

a question about a person's immigration status. There is no way for the Census Bureau to know, based on the information that it collects, the people that are way for the Census Bureau to know, based on information that it collects, the people that are counted for the 2020 census, what people's immigration status are. And so to try to exclude unauthorized immigrants would require creating essentially estimates based on statistical sampling, something that the Supreme Court has already ruled cannot be used when we're talking about the apportionment count. That when we're talking about how to divide up seats in Congress, we have to use numbers

from the actual counting, not from sampling. So can we assume that the president might be influencing these decisions that are being made within the Census Bureau as well? Or is that sort of a leap in logic that you're not ready to make? I haven't been able to confirm that, but I think one thing I'm trying to figure out is on April 13th, the same day, the Commerce Secretary, Wilbur Ross, made this public announcement with the Census Bureau director and saying, we've asked Congress for a 120-day extension for reporting deadlines. The president came out during his then daily press briefings at the White House to say that—

The Census Bureau has asked Congress for a 120 extension. I don't know that you even have to ask them. This is called an act of God. This is called a situation that has to be, they have to give. And I think 120 days isn't nearly enough. My administration... So the president is willing to admit the census is this sacred institution, but he'd also like to tweak it in a few unprecedented and arguably unconstitutional ways. The census ends at the end of September as things stand now.

Your confidence in it being legitimate? It is a big question of how much of the country will end up being counted by the end of September. More with Hansi after a break. Support for Today Explained comes from Ramp. Ramp is the corporate card and spend management software designed to help you save time and put money back in your pocket. Ramp says they give finance teams unprecedented control and insight into company spend. With Ramp, you're able to issue cards to every employee with limits and restrictions and automate expense reporting so you can stop wasting time at the end of every month. And now you can get $250 when you join Ramp. You can go to ramp.com slash explained, ramp.com slash explained, r-a-m-p.com slash explained. Cards issued by Sutton Bank, member FDIC, terms and conditions apply. 2020, 2020, 2020. Hansi, remind people how the census is conducted.

So to conduct the census, the Census Bureau collects information through an online form, through call centers, through paper forms in the mail. They also send out door knockers to visit households that haven't filled out a form themselves. They also send out census workers to what's known as group quarters, group living situations such as nursing homes, sometimes to prisons, to shelters for people experiencing homelessness, to dorms and student housing. There are also census workers that go out to RV parks to make sure that folks living in transitory locations are counted. Some of that has

really been scaled back because of the pandemic, but some of that is still happening. This has to be a count of every person living in the country, including in the most remote parts of the country. Back in January, I went to some of those areas and on the western coast, southwestern coast of Alaska, in Alaska native villages in Tuk-Suk Bay, that is where the census counting officially started. And that is part of special operations that the Census Bureau does once a decade, sending out census workers who sometimes take bush planes, who sometimes ride in dog sleds, snowmobiles, or snow machines as they call them up in Alaska. And that is all to make sure that even if you live in the most remote parts of the country,

the hardest to reach parts of the country, that you're still counted, that someone is coming to your door, even if you can't get mail regularly, someone's going to come to your door to ask you questions to make sure you're counted. And just for people who don't know, what is at stake here? You know, one way to think about it is that the entire country would be flying blind, really, for the next decade.

We wouldn't know exactly who is living in this country. And that's information that we rely on to determine how to divvy up political power, how to divvy up federal funding, an estimated $1.5 trillion a year in federal tax dollars for Medicare, for Medicaid, for schools, for roads. That's all determined in part based on census results. And so what's at stake here is that some communities might not get their fair share in federal funding and political representation for the next 10 years. And there seems to be no chance that they just kibosh the 2020 census and do it in 2021. That's

not being considered right now? I have not heard that. And the thing to keep in mind here is this is a constitutional mandate to do a counting of an actual enumeration once every 10 years, and we're due for it this year. So if this year's census, with all of the drama over the citizenship question, with all of the COVID-19 drama, and now all of this most recent drama about whether or not you're going to count people who are maybe undocumented or not with this presidential memo, I wonder, would we go with this census's data no matter what, even if it's not nearly as accurate as it should be? Or is there a chance that we would go with the data from the last census in 2010? These are all questions that the country will have to grapple with after the counting is finished for the 2020 census and we start to see results.

It's hard to overstate the implications here because in addition to congressional seats and funding for public services, we're also talking about voting districts all the way down to the local level. We're also talking about major policy decisions. You know, by the time when there is a coronavirus vaccine and public health officials have to figure out how many vaccination shots each community may need, they'll likely have to turn to census numbers. And so these numbers

are just so influential in daily life in the United States. There is a lot at stake to just say, let's throw out these numbers. And this is also a headcount that is costing an estimated $16 billion, which is not a lot in the greater scheme of the federal budget, but there has been pressure from Congress for years for the Census Bureau to cut down on the cost of the census. So it's going to be a big ask to ask for more money to conduct a whole new census, not to mention any legal questions. Is it possible to conduct a whole new census that would be used for reapportioning seats in Congress? That's an open question right now. Is there a chance that, you know, there's a better way to do this? Have we learned anything from this 2020 experience that, I don't know, maybe there's a better option out there on how to conduct this census? There have been discussions within the Census Bureau for years now to rely more on existing government records. This is something that the Census Bureau has done for decades. But what's being considered is using

these records to a greater extent in order to come up with essentially demographic profiles of people living in the country. And rather than relying on households volunteering their information by filling out a form on their own or by being interviewed, something that is very costly, and the Census Bureau has been experiencing declining response rates for decades. But the thing to keep in mind here is that so far, research has shown not every person living in the country is equally represented in these records. And what that means is that relying more on these records could result in white people being overrepresented and people of color being underrepresented because these

records are not a reliable source of information about every resident in the country so far. So the existing mix of online and mail and door-to-door is the best system we've got. Have the politics and the pandemic and the drama of this 2020 census done lasting damage to the institution? to be under this political cloud and all of these controversies that seemingly don't stop. And their fear is that it has tainted the public's perception of not only the census, but also the Census Bureau and whether or not people will associate this headcount with all the controversies that have come up under this administration. That is a major concern, that an institution that really strives to be nonpartisan,

that these are really folks who are trying to put out the best, most accurate data about what's happening in the country, to put it out for public consumption, and are trying to follow the science, follow best practice, and to really research and research and research every step and decision that they make before they carry out a census or any other survey that they do. That all of these last minute changes and all this pressure to shorten their work and go against the advice and analysis put forth by career officials. All of this has really raised a lot of concern that the Census Bureau's public perception is being harmed.

And when we're talking about the census, public perception is a big part of it because it requires the public to feel comfortable to trust the Census Bureau with their personal information and trust that federal laws that protect that information will be upheld. Hansi Lowong reports on the people, power, and money behind the 2020 census for NPR. Hansi, before we go, anything you want people out there to know about the census? It's not over yet after all. I think it's important for people to know that there is no citizenship question on the 2020 census because that question has been blocked by federal courts. A lot of people still don't know that. And door knockers from the Census Bureau are out there. But if you are worried and you do

not want to interact with a worker from the Census Bureau for whatever reason, you don't have to. You can fill out a form on your own if you haven't already by going to my2020census.gov, calling one of the toll-free numbers, and you could do that instead of being interviewed by a door knocker. Anzi, thank you. We appreciate your work on the 2020 Census. You're welcome, Sean.