Today, Explained - Who counts as white on the census?

Episode Date: August 18, 2021

Some recent analysis of America’s changing demographics is inaccurate and dangerous. NPR’s Hansi Lo Wang makes sense of the 2020 census. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Support Today, Explained by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600 or visit connectsontario.ca. It's Today Explained. I'm Halima Shah. And perhaps you've seen some of the headlines in the last week that say something to the effect of, the white population is in decline. For the first time on record, the white population in the United States has declined. Just released data from the 2020 census shows the white population in America is down 8.6% from 2010. Here's what those numbers show.

The number, not the proportion, but the absolute number of Americans who describe themselves as white has dropped for the first time in our history. The total decline is around 5 million people. Now that is huge. But that's not the full story, at all. If you talk to Hansi Lo Wang, he's a correspondent at NPR, whose literal job is to report on the census, those headlines really miss the mark.

When you see this kind of white box on the census form, that group has dropped over the past decade by 8.6%. But if you expand the white population to also include people who checked off white and one or more of the other racial categories, then the white population has grown 1.9% since 2010. And the bottom line here is that white people still make up the largest racial or ethnic group in the United States. And what happens when statements like the white population is in decline are in the headlines? What's the impact of that? What this risks is an oversimplification of a very

complicated and messy topic, race in the United States of America. And some people tracking far right white racial extremism have been worried about this kind of a headline about a so-called declining white population. This kind of stuff could fuel propaganda. White people are being marginalized, but you're not allowed to notice. You're not even allowed to talk about it. And if you disagree with them being marginalized, you're racist. Some psychologists have done research on how white people in general react when they hear about changes in the racial demographics in the United States.

And when they hear about a declining white population, it tends to raise anxiety and concern about the future of their status in U.S. society. It's racist, of course, because supposedly white people are the villains of human history. That is an absurd calumny. The truth is that the specter of white supremacy is used to fuel the growth of a corrupt political order, and whites are in fact the victims in this system. And we should keep in mind that the changes in the white population as captured by this new census data is likely not just the result of demographic shifts, you know, not just because of changes in

births, deaths, and migration, but also could be the result of how the Bureau changed how it categorized the responses people wrote in about their identities on census forms. This is a change that may have increased the number of people recorded in this new census data as identifying with more than one race. And I'm sure that this has been debated since the country's inception, but today in 2021, what exactly does it mean to be white? Well, the Census Bureau has to follow a very formal definition set by the White House's Office of Management and Budget. And it says anyone with, quote, origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa,

unquote, should be categorized as white in government data about race. But we have to remember that census data is produced through how people report their racial identities themselves. And they may have different concepts of who is white. Some people may be thinking about their family trees. Some people may be thinking about their white privilege. Some people may be thinking about what they're most comfortable telling the federal government what their racial identity is on a census form. And I can see people, especially someone from the Middle East or North Africa region, who might fit the description of white but doesn't identify as white, having a hard time with that question on the census. What exactly does the census data mean for them? Well, it means that folks with Middle Eastern or North African origins

are essentially hidden in this new census data about race and ethnicity. Because if you identify as Lebanese or Egyptian, for example, according to these federal government standards, you should be characterized as white, which, like you said, for some people, does not match how they see themselves, does not match how others see their racial identities. And there has been a decades-long push by some Arab American advocacy groups for a separate checkbox on census forms to collect race ethnicity data specifically about people with Middle Eastern or North African origins. Right. And I think Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, who is Palestinian American, has been really vocal about this. We need to get it right because I'm not white. I'm not.

And I don't try to say to others that you should be this or that. But when I sit on this form and I look at it, I don't see myself represented on this form. That almost happened for the 2020 census, but the Trump administration effectively blocked that from happening, as well as other changes to the census race and Hispanic origin questions. And we may get more detailed data about race, ethnicity later from the 2020 census. But for now, those folks, their data is captured in the white data, if that's how they identified on the 2020 census. The conversation, the dialogue about race is always changing in this country. Does the census respond to those conversations and to those changes? lot of research ahead of conducting a national headcount specifically about race and ethnicity

and how concepts of that have changed over the years in order to try to have a form that best reflects how the country is thinking about racial ethnic demographics. But if you look back at the very start of the U.S. census, way back to 1790, it really shows you also just this, these concepts were really, in terms of the census, were determined by people who had power and who had influence. 1790, the categories were free white, all other free persons, and slaves. In 1850, mulatto was first used, and it made return appearances as late as 1910 and 1920. 1890 included quadroon and octoroon. In 1920, Hindu was added as a racial category. And we have to remember, it was not until 1960 when U.S. residents were first allowed to self-report their race on the census. Until 1960, it was a government worker, a representative of the federal government,

whether that be a Census Bureau worker or, way back in the day, a U.S. marshal on horseback, determining what to mark down for your race. And sometimes it matched with maybe how you thought about your race. Sometimes it didn't. It didn't matter. That wasn't for you to determine for the census. And it wasn't until 2000 when U.S. residents were allowed to check off more than one box, more than one racial category, when answering the race question for the census. So it sounds like we have to take racial data dating all the way back to the year

1790 with a grain of salt. How comparable is the data that was just collected to previous years? You know, that's a very tricky question. The Census Bureau itself put out a statement before it released this new race ethnicity data from the 2020 census. And it said, you know, comparing 2020 data with 2010 data from a decade ago should be done with a lot of caution because of how the race question has changed over the past 10 years and because of how the Census Bureau changed how it sorted through people's write-in responses. All of this are factors that really raise questions about how comparable this 2020 data is with 2010 data and with data from 1790 and onward. So Hansi, we've talked about people from the Middle East, North Africa region potentially becoming invisible on the census. Are there other groups who are left out when answering the race

question on the census? You know, what's interesting is that according to the 2020 census results, the second largest racial group in the United States of America is a group that's called some other race. And this is a group that was the third largest racial group in 2010, as well as 2000. So it's growing in prominence according to these census results. And the Census Bureau says, according to its research, that most of the folks who identify with some other race also identify as Hispanic or Latino. And it is a reflection, the Census Bureau says, of what its research has already shown, that the way that the census forms asked about race as well as people's Hispanic or Latino origins

does not reflect the way a lot of people, especially folks who identify as Latino, think about their identities. I think the Latino identity is pretty confusing to me because oftentimes I find it in a little checkbox on a form and I'm confused on whether I should put Latino or Hispanic, but I'm Mexican. It is a two-part question for the 2020 census forms. First, it asks the person, are you of Hispanic? Is this person of Hispanic or Latino origin? And then it asks, what is this person's race? And for a lot of folks who identify as

Latino, not all, but a lot of folks, they get to the race question and they don't see a box for Hispanic or Latino. And for a lot of folks, some other race is the best out of no really good options. What we were supposed to have seen on the 2020 census forms was a what's known as combined question that would have asked about race, ethnicity together and Hispanic origins together. And alongside white, black, the Asian categories, for example, there would also be a category for Hispanic or Latino. And by presenting the question in that way, the Census Bureau's research showed that it would have collected more accurate data to capture the diversity within the Latino community.

So why didn't it happen? Because the Trump administration didn't make a decision on a proposal to change these federal standards that the Census Bureau has to follow. Census Bureau had to get approval, essentially, from the White House's Office of Management and Budget. And these proposals, Trump administration didn't make any decision on them, no public decision. So the Census Bureau had to move forward, had to get forms finalized and printed, and essentially were stuck with basically the same format that was used for 2010.

Hansi, almost exactly a year ago, we were talking about the Trump administration with you on Today Explained, and you said that the pandemic and interference from the administration was potentially going to have an effect on the data. Did that end up happening? The decisions of the Trump administration about the census certainly is a factor in how the 2020 census results were produced. The extent to which they were a factor, we don't know. But we do know that the Trump administration had a failed push to add a citizenship question.

And today, the president announcing he's still trying to find a way to ask a question about citizenship on the census after the Supreme Court had stopped the administration's efforts. That took up a lot of attention and likely made a lot of folks question, especially folks in households with immigrants, question whether or not

they should participate in the census. And then during counting, the Trump administration pushed and successfully ended door-knocking efforts earlier than expected. Door-knocking efforts that were a key part of the Census Bureau's plan to make sure that historically undercounted groups, immigrants, people of color, renters, rural residents, groups that were less likely to participate and fill out a form themselves. We need that door knocking. We need that in-person contact that we've not been able to have in large part because of COVID.

That type of outreach was ended earlier than expected and could have exacerbated what are expected to be undercounts of Latinos, Black people, Native Americans, all groups that were undercounted in 2010. And we're not going to know for sure to the extent to which groups were undercounted or overcounted, not until early 2022 when the Census Bureau releases this information. But we do know that there was a higher rate of households not answering the Hispanic origin and the race question than in past counts. And in 2022, we are also set to have a midterm election. Do we know what influence the Trump administration's interference might have on redistricting?

Well, that interference is baked into this data. These new population numbers, as well as this race, ethnicity data, all this information is going to form the foundation for voting maps that will be drawn for elections at every level of government. Congress, state houses, local government. And we're talking about elections for the next 10 years. After the break, Hansi explains how this census will reshape the next decade of American politics. 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,

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Hansi, for those of us who are not census reporters, how is data used when it comes to drawing congressional districts? Well, congressional districts, as well as other voting districts at other levels of government, are generally supposed to be reflective of the population as determined by the census results. And generally supposed to be equal in size and drawn fairly. And there are lots of different ways of measuring it. But essentially, political mapmakers take this data about population sizes, these very basic demographic characteristics, and try to draw voting districts that are representative. And the extent to which they actually do that is often challenged in courts as part of the redistricting cycle, as we've seen it in past ones. And data is, from the census, it plays a big role in trying to answer, was this map drawn fairly? And who exactly gets the authority to draw these districts? Voting maps,

how they're drawn, who draws them, all of that is determined for the most part by state lawmakers. And often that is determined along party lines, who has control of those state houses. But in some parts of the country, it's an independent redistricting commission. In some parts of the country, courts have a key role in finalizing and approving voting maps and to see if they're drawn fairly. So what's the timeline for when all of this happens? And how is that affected by the fact that we just had a delay in getting the census data out?

We just had a major delay, a more than four-month delay, which, you know, we're in the middle of a pandemic. We're also in the middle of back-to-school season. People have a lot on their minds. But for folks in the redistricting world, this delay has been weighing on their minds. And finally, finally, for them, this new redistricting data is out from the Census Bureau. And it has really just put a lot of pressure, especially on states with early legal deadlines to finish the first drafts. In Colorado and Oregon, mapmakers have less than seven weeks to get their first draft done. Early numbers from April showed Colorado's population grew nearly 15% over the last

decade. That's enough to give Colorado an extra seat in Congress next year. Ohio's redistricting commission has less than three weeks. Ohio is one of seven states losing a congressional seat, going from 16 to 15, starting with next year's election. That's because of the decline in the state's population. So it's a lot of pressure. And this is a process that in other parts of the country is going to go into 2022. But it is all in preparation for the most part for next year's midterm elections, November 2022. And so there is a ticking clock here. And let's keep in mind, it's not about just getting voting maps drawn. It's

also about candidates who are going to run in those elections, filing applications to actually run in those elections. And they would probably want to know what are the lines of the districts that they are going to possibly represent. And right now, that's an open question. What will the latest data we got from this census mean for people who make voting maps? Well, what political mapmakers have to keep in mind is not just changes in population sizes, but also the racial and ethnic demographics and how that may have changed over the past decade. And that's because of the Voting Rights Act, which has protections in place to help ensure that the voting power of minority groups is not diluted by these new voting maps. And that's why we'll likely see some legal challenges once draft voting maps are out. A lot of civil rights groups are watching this process

very closely to see if these new voting maps are representative of racial and ethnic demographic shifts. There may be a merging community of voters of color in certain parts of the country. And if their voting power is essentially diluted and broken up, there might be some challenges in court. And when might we see this actually start playing out in elections? Well, all these redistricting efforts are really trying to gear up for elections next November 2022. So everyone in the British-speaking world is essentially rushing to get ready for that election day. But again, to keep in mind, it's not just about next November's elections. It's about the next 10 years of elections because these voting maps

are supposed to last for the next decade, not until the next census in 2030. Until after the next census in 2030, will there be new voting maps drawn? There might be some court cases that throw out some of these new voting maps at some point, but for the most part, we're going to have to live with these maps for the next 10 years. All right. Well, Hansi Lo Wang, we will see you in 2030. Hope to see you earlier than that, but sure. Yeah, 2030. Hansi Lo Wang is a national correspondent for NPR. He reports on the people, power, and money behind the U.S. Census. I'm Halima Shah, and the Today Explained team is made of Amina Alsadi,

Afim Shapiro, Matt Collette, Miles Bryan, Will Reed, and Victoria Chamberlain. Our facts are checked by Laura Bullard. Our music is made by Breakmaster Cylinder and Noam Hassenfeld. Our vice president of audio is Liz Kelly Nelson, and Jillian Weinberger is her deputy. We got extra help from Paul Mounsey, and Jillian Weinberger is her deputy. We got extra help from Paul Mounsey, and we got no help from Sean Ramos-Furham, but that'll change when he's back next week. Today Explained is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network, and we love hearing from you, so get in touch with us at todayexplained at vox.com. Thank you.