GOP steals elections. Breaking news?
Great reporting, Tierney. There is not enough coverage of this issue on the most general level, let alone on the nitty gritty of what is trying to be done and why. Thanks - and keep it up!
I thought that citizenship question was still in litigation
Chief Justice John Roberts: “Our country has changed…voting tests were abolished, disparities in voter registration and turnout due to race were erased, and African-Americans attained political office in record numbers. And yet the coverage formula that Congress reauthorized in 2006 ignores these developments, keeping the focus on decades-old data relevant to decades-old problems, rather than current data reflecting current needs.”
“Post-racial America” now is free from all that ancient history of racial discrimination.
(Or something.)
This has been a long term goal of Conservatives. IMHO - and many - it is unconstitutional for federal offices given the structure of the constitution, which talks about “persons” and also of the very clear view that non-citizens counted for representation purposes, which is why the founders had to compromise on slaves counting as 3/5s of a person.
That said, I have little faith that 3 members of the supreme court (Alito, Thomas, Gorsuch) are deciding issues based upon a genuine view of the law, but instead on politics, and the jury is still out on Kav.
The issue will certainly come up, with the question being how Roberts votes. Does he do what the Right wants, or does he pretect his and the Court’s legitimacy.
This said, that it can’t be done at the Federal Level, does not mean that it can’t be done at the State Level. E.g. Texas could try to do it at the state level, ditto Arizona or Georgia. But it would require the republicans to be in control of all three branches of government.
Taxation without representation always goes down well in American politics.
I think it is still in litigation. Making this even more sketchy.
Republicans to non-Citizen constituents: Fuck you!
Different issue. since the 1950 cencus there has been no questions collected on either the long or short form census on citizenship. Instead the census collects it another way, via a survey it does.
The litigation involves adding a citizenship question to the census, which will depress the response rate. The challenges say this is improper for a number of procedural and substantive reasons. But they also say that its unneccessary since what DOJ/Commerce says they need the data for - “VRA enforcement” (a laugh line since Trump is not doing any enforcement), even were it the real justification, can be done based upon the survey data.
My guess is that this is Trump’s fall back, and they put this out there because they know they are likely to loose before Furhman, and they want to make the survey data available so Conservatives can try to use that data. But, of course, putting out this data, suggests that its good enough, and there is no need for (VRA enforcement purposes) to puton a citizenship question.
Doing so raises some new questions (at least for congressional districts) since the enumeration is supposed to determine population, and it is likely unconstitutional to use that enumeration data, adjusted for citizenship by a survey.
So this is IMHO very sneaky, but its an admission of weakness by the Trumpsters, trying to create a fall back position when they lose on the census question.
The whole citizenship question is the third leg of the Republican hegemony stool - own the federal courts all the way up and through SCOTUS, roll back voting rights in every manner possible and change the basic power dynamics of representation through weaponized gerrymandering, redistricting by citizenship, etc. It is a solid plan that will allow them to hold on to power much longer than actual democracy will.
Is this all part of the planned slow rolling coup. It’s also explains why the Cons simply no longer even pretend to give a f*ck about norms or the rule of law.
Once they have solidified power they won’t have anyone to answer to. This has been an ongoing operation since reconstruction. They’ve been playin the long game and seem better at it too. Truly devious.
Texas has Republican control of all 3 branches. That said if passed and a challenge was brought through the state courts it would have to come through Austin and the Travis county courts which are 100% Democratic and the 1st level if appellate court 3rd district is also majority Democratic post the 2018 election. Unfortunately the Texas Supreme Court is Republican controlled and bought.
Sooo when will they start counting “businesses” as people too? I mean my Congresswoman has never held an in person town hall meeting since she was elected in 2012. But this year she sure did like to show off how many businesses she went to, talked to owners, smiled at employees, and got her picture taken in front of the business’ sign.
And of course this sampled data, which the right wing has always claimed before to be too inaccurate to use for census purposes, will now suddenly be accurate enough to extrapolate for redistricting.
Another reason to push hard on state-level races.
We did add 15 Democrats to the leg in the midterms. GOP still control the leg, but we’re creeping them.
A/k/a Plan B. This is actually the more direct approach. Plan A…adding the citizenship question in order to taint the data by instigating non-responses…was more of an end-run, a way of screwing non-citizens and minorities in favor of white citizens on the back end. It also would have made things waaaaaay harder to correct.
This, Plan B, is how they’ve pretty much been doing things with ALEC and Koch Brother and other groups’ guidance forever: initiate a wave of attempts to circumvent the law, test the constitution and then try to win by getting it in front of some activist conservative douchenozzle judge. They definitely want places like WI, NC, and MI to try their hand at using the citizenship data to gerrymander themselves silly…maybe even reach for the brass ring by just using citizenship data and ignoring whole-population data, then trying to defend by making the case that non-citizens simply shouldn’t count in redistricting in any way. They literally couldn’t be more encouraged by the appointment of Gorsuch and Kavanaugh by the people who said Hillary was the same as Trump.
Using citizenship, rather than population, is the end game for alt right white nationalists, and the Trump regime scheme to use it for redistricting is unsurprising. It’s contrary to the words in the Constitution, and is a cynical move to make rural areas — who already have disproportionate power — continue to control the government.
The GOP has given up on democracy and wants to retain power as a shrinking minority.
The B*stard gutted the Voting Rights Act. It was one of several decisions where the law was so twisted you could bake it into a pretzel.
He will do the RIGHT thing and allow this unconstitutional bravo sierra to stand.