The undocumented are a large part of the work force on farms, ranches and other agribusinesses such as food processing and meat packing plants. As a result, rural America is full of the undocumented. A “citizen only” census count will shortchange rural areas for representation and federal funds. This gambit is not going to help the Republicans.
How Trump’s Anti-Immigrant Census Power Grab Throws Rural States Under The Bus | Talking Points Memo
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I read the other day that the Census usually gets a hard count on everyone except about 1% of the population, and then does some statistical modeling or uses other information for that last bit. The prediction right now is that they will miss 15%…that’s close to 50 million people. That alone should show that the count will be broken this year, and that it’s not going to be accurate enough for all the things that are based on it…which is a perfect reason for the next administration to do an “update count” to fix the problems with the current Census. We may also get a look at the records (the Census civil staff will keep the receipts), so any purposeful wrongdoing will be recorded, and hopefully prosecuted. This is probably going to be one of the important things the Biden administration sorts out, and makes transparent…along with the USPS the Census is just something that shouldn’t be messed with for political gain.
And, really, it’s irrelevant which political party will gain from this, because all Americans lose from having an inaccurate Census. It needs to be done right, even if that means fixing it next year.
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A “citizen only” census does not do what the constitution requires it to do. Easily defeated in court.
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Nope.
Trump has no such authority.
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I don’t think he can do that either. Would he try is the better question. I wouldn’t put it past him. He’s trying to sue NV for a legal vote in their legislature to allow mail-in voting. He has no authority there either but it hasn’t stopped him from using DoJ to fight his fights for him.
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Would he even suggest postponing the election? We’ve seen what he thinks he is capable of doing. He’s a big boy now. Look what I can do!
Or, to identify targets for the black helicopters carrying blue and white helmeted UN thugs.
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If I’m not mistaken, Los Angeles County is one of the red ones on this map. They’ll need door-to-door Census people as much as West Texas.
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Ssssh. Let them figure it out on their own.
Yep, Trump not having the authority isn’t stopping him from trying things. Just imagine a set of goons in tactical gear drive up in an unmarked minivan and go to grab up a poll drop box…who is going to stop them? When they say they are feds and are taking the “illegal ballot boxes”, by the time anyone can be called to do something about it they will likely be gone. Having it happen with teams all over at once would cause a huge controversy, and by the time the lawsuits were flying the election might be over, and those ballot boxes never counted.
This kind of thing is going to happen…Republicans will be sending “poll watchers” all over the nation, with the likely intent to interfere with people voting. Asking every single black voter in Atlanta to prove their eligibility will make for huge lines, add in characters “patrolling” outside the station and all of the GA vote cheating and GA and its two Senate seats will be lost. Multiply that by districts all over the nation, and it’s clear how that would cause problems…and all that has to happen is the election be close enough for Trump to declare “victory” despite what the outcome is. The chaos and cheating is going to be used as a reason to doubt the results, and the fact that Trump and the Republicans are going to cause it will be beside the point.
Voting by mail will get around this, and enough states are controlled by Democrats or have Democrats in the process that cheating will be difficult with mail-in ballots, as long as they get to the offices in time. That makes voting early critical this time around…if Republicans and Trump hold power then they have made it obvious in the past month what the nation will be like in the future, and it won’t be for the benefit of average Americans.
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So are the GOPers going to remain silent on a partial population count in the 2020 census?
People, beware,what does he care? A mental patient is " managing" the pandemic and it shows.
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The Republicans will of course claim it’s a Democratic power grab (it’s always projection with these people), and the Democrats may reason that it wouldn’t be worth the political hay they’d be giving these fascists.
But obviously you are correct on the merits.
Maybe some of the Republican states that are going to be hammered by this (cf Western Texas) will fight it, though I imagine their governors will put the interests of The Party ahead of their own state.
Everything the evil trump enablers has to be undone . He’s really not smart enough to come up with any of this on his own - but the slime that surrounds him has wanted to F up the census for ever.
If it needs to be re-done in 2021, it would at least have the benefit of creating a large number of temporary jobs. We’re going to need them.
As in hoist? Hee, Hee, Hee. Love that expression.
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We’re told at least that the Dems are ready for these GOP tricks. I guess we’ll find out. I wouldn’t dare be a GOP “poll watcher”. I like keeping my mouth full of teeth.
Absolutely. Easy to point out the problems – delay in getting started; appropriately asking for more time; then deciding on specious grounds to rush the process.
Redoing the Census under those circumstances makes all kinds of sense. Need a Democratic White House and Democratic Senate to get it done – and then a year or two in the courts while GOP fights it, but it should be doable.
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Thanks for pointing this out. Perhaps I’m misreading the map, but it’s not just a question of relative state Congressional representation, but also the distribution of population within individual states. I think the map is showing us that within significant states (eg Texas), the rural areas are losing population relative to the urban areas. If that’s right, then there may well be Democratic gains in (presumably) red states.
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Exactly. This isn’t as easy as either side thinks. In the end I think Trump is hurting Republicans more than he understands. A whole lot of undocumented illegals live in rural areas. Many work in meat packing or in other agriculture industries. If they aren’t counted it will be harder for Republicans to gerrymander. This is what happens when you appoint a 90 year old crook to run the census and he is assisted by brain dead ideologues who only understand public relations.
Think about California, the agricultural valleys might lose a representative if they don’t count undocumented. The same with Texas.
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