Conservatives on Supreme Court Appear Ready to Support Trump Effort to Count Less Immigrants in US Census

Trump Remade SCOTUS Into a Far Right Conservative Court. It Now Looks Ready to Allow Him to Harm Immigrants – and Democrats – Even More.

Conservatives are making great strides in disenfranchising immigrants and imposing a stranglehold on America’s electoral system with the implicit goal of ensuring Republican majorities despite the actual number of Democrats across the country.

Here’s how it works.

First, convince the U.S. Supreme Court to gut the Voting Rights Act.

Check. Completed in 2013.

Once that was done, Republican-majority states across the country enacted harsh voter ID laws and gerrymandered congressional districts to ensure fewer lower-income residents and fewer people of color – who historically vote in larger numbers for Democrats – were able to vote, or have their votes “count.”

These pie charts perfectly illustrate what’s going on:

And now, the Trump administration’s attacks on immigrants just appears to have won a major – and some say, unconstitutional – battle.

Despite having lied to Congress, Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross appears to have been successful in achieving President Trump’s wish to add a citizenship question to the U.S. Census. The Commerce Dept. is in charge of the census.

Opponents of the question, which has never before been added to the constitutionally-mandated census taken every 10 years, rightly say it will scare immigrants from filling out the census, thus undercounting them.

Remember, the Constitution mandates every person – not just every citizen –shall be counted.

Given the Trump administration’s harsh roundups, detentions, and deportations of immigrants, why would anyone want to risk the thinly veiled threat that question poses?

Tuesday the U.S Supreme Court heard arguments about adding the citizenship question to the 2020 census, which is sent to every household in the country.

“Conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices on Tuesday appeared sympathetic toward a bid by President Donald Trump’s administration to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, a plan opponents have called a Republican effort to deter immigrants from taking part in the population count,” Reuters reports.

Attempts to add the question were blocked by lower courts, so the Trump administration, as it repeatedly does, asked the Supreme Court to weigh in.

“Opponents have said inclusion of the question would cause a sizeable undercount by frightening immigrant households and Latinos from filling out the census,” Reuters adds, “fearful that the information would be shared with law enforcement. This would cost Democratic-leaning areas electoral representation in Congress and federal aid, benefiting Republican-leaning parts of the country, they said.”

Opponents are correct.

Experts are weighing in on today’s SCOTUS hearing:

Former U.S. Attorney:

Voting rights expert:

Yesterday he warned:

Supreme Court reporter for The Washington Post:

SCOTUS reporter for The Economist: