[EL] Citizenship and the census

Wed Jun 5 01:24:44 PDT 2019

There was one and only one reason (VRA enforcement) cited in the Dec. 2017 DOJ letter to the Census Bureau.  Any other redistricting-related motivation DOJ might have had in asking for the change would have been beyond the mandate of the Civil Rights Division’s enforcement authorities under federal law.  (DOJ has no capacity to enforce the equal population requirement at issue in Evenwel, and so has no official interest in requesting that the Census Bureau take action facilitating state decisions on the matter.) And there was one and only one reason (VRA enforcement, at the DOJ’s request) cited by Sec. Ross in _his_ 2018 decision letter for making the change.

If DOJ personnel had other motivations — acknowledged in depositions or recently revealed in third-party documents or otherwise — that makes things worse, not better, for the DOJ.

The basis of the APA is that agencies have plentiful discretion to change policy direction based on different interpretations of the evidence, but they have to show real evidence and have to give the real reasons for their actions.

--
Justin Levitt
justin.levitt at lls.edu<mailto:justin.levitt at lls.edu>

On Jun 4, 2019, at 5:10 PM, Rick Hasen <rhasen at law.uci.edu<mailto:rhasen at law.uci.edu>> wrote:

DOJ’s John Gore Said in His Deposition That One of the Purposes of Collecting Citizenship Data on the Census Forms is To Let States Draw Districts with Equal Numbers of Eligible Voters (Which Hurts Hispanics and Democratic Voters)<https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2felectionlawblog.org%2f%3fp%3d105455&c=E,1,o6bLiTrX2Sj2pLoUrDhsJTZTtkWE-CeJPZ39F_MV2yYEtmjEy0-zJJ8Tg_yyThzuETUQdqch11I-WrnOUJ-ZVJJcyPpi-UnJLgvUuwMQwUD2EEww&typo=1>
Posted on June 4, 2019 2:10 pm<https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2felectionlawblog.org%2f%3fp%3d105455&c=E,1,_xh4aaazFRkh1wxj98nOgyqlVYNqv4qy8wAqq7xK5inq-WvLS6wXga961VwNamQgR-hCLmyauRRRmqeZ0P0JCi6XvBMMeQLe1PyuMjsgmteupNk,&typo=1> by Rick Hasen<https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2felectionlawblog.org%2f%3fauthor%3d3&c=E,1,eCctBGcsfN1kBXaY9WxrnZ6BBGCz7rUpZDKEoakq2szW3KT6KXmCDsg-KUKLOphxuY7Dd7VSU3HBuvSBxUKM7cDUhbbrtLJFwkqZCt52Rlyxix0AAcN_bg,,&typo=1>

The other day I tweeted this<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1135710509808832513>:
<image002.jpg><https://twitter.com/rickhasen>
<https://twitter.com/rickhasen>
Rick Hasen<https://twitter.com/rickhasen>
✔@rickhasen<https://twitter.com/rickhasen>

<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1135710509808832513>

This is a key point and shows that whether or not DOJ borrowed from Hoefeller, the motivation was to allow states to engage in redistricting based on voter eligible persons, which would dilute the votes of Hispanic voters---precisely the opposite of what government has said.
<https://twitter.com/Tierney_Megan/status/1135706708389629952>
Tierney Sneed<https://twitter.com/Tierney_Megan/status/1135706708389629952>
✔@Tierney_Megan<https://twitter.com/Tierney_Megan/status/1135706708389629952>
Replying to @Tierney_Megan<https://twitter.com/Tierney_Megan/status/1135706708389629952>

DOJ is now suggesting that Evenwel is where Gore turned for help w/ the request, which is probably a clue that the underlying issue in that case (excluding noncitizens from redistricting) was the chief motivation for adding a citizenship question<https://twitter.com/Tierney_Megan/status/1135706708389629952>
<image003.jpg><https://twitter.com/Tierney_Megan/status/1135706708389629952>

<https://twitter.com/intent/like?tweet_id=1135710509808832513>
51<https://twitter.com/intent/like?tweet_id=1135710509808832513>
5:51 PM - Jun 3, 2019<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1135710509808832513>
Twitter Ads info and privacy<https://support.twitter.com/articles/20175256>
<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1135710509808832513>
28 people are talking about this<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1135710509808832513>

I’ve since been pointed to pages 180-81 of John Gore’s deposition in the census case, where he appears to acknowledge that one of DOJ’s purposes early on in asking for the citizenship question to go on the census was to allow jurisdictions to draw districts with equal numbers of voter eligible persons (as opposed to total population, which would hurt<https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/05/census-memo-supreme-court-conservatives-white-voters-alito.html> Hispanic voters and Democrats). Look especially at the last sentence of the excerpt below:
<image004.png><image005.png>

With all the debate over the Hofeller stuff, let’s not forget that there is really no credible evidence DOJ wanted the question added to the census to help Hispanic voters in Voting Rights Act section 2 cases (which the Trump DOJ has never brought). The intention is only to hurt Hispanic voters, whether or not the Hofeller evidence ever gets before the Supreme Court.
<image001.png><https://www.addtoany.com/share#url=https%3A%2F%2Felectionlawblog.org%2F%3Fp%3D105455&title=DOJ%E2%80%99s%20John%20Gore%20Said%20in%20His%20Deposition%20That%20One%20of%20the%20Purposes%20of%20Collecting%20Citizenship%20Data%20on%20the%20Census%20Forms%20is%20To%20Let%20States%20Draw%20Districts%20with%20Equal%20Numbers%20of%20Eligible%20Voters%20(Which%20Hurts%20Hispanics%20and%20Democratic%20Voters)>
Posted in census litigation<https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2felectionlawblog.org%2f%3fcat%3d125&c=E,1,fKE1f-Bz42Y0rXwB976CWimMz23-USe7TubLXntlD5Rw0g8JE8hraJzSAH6rjKEo1gXg8e_lZb1B7LcgUK1gZZL9ThVwws9kCRdtlnVnxB0EnNJq923wq2oVuubj&typo=1>, Supreme Court<https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=https%3a%2f%2felectionlawblog.org%2f%3fcat%3d29&c=E,1,Zc7oLzw1wkem27xcxOD0xIV_MOXb60JgvY4f18FIBYazk1KF8oXEiTGmJWzKyysBXXtwjSAixr8DvaH2Ijy0oGRiD-TJOZNcpbF0Ca2BTISXWmSVPp8,&typo=1>
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