Just days after a federal judge blocked the Trump administration’s political attempt to end the 2020 census a month early on Sept. 30, the U.S. Census Bureau said in a tweet Monday that it would it be ending all counting by a new “target date of October 5” anyway. The decree-by-tweet came as U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh was holding a hearing in the ongoing case, leaving her “’disturbed’ that ‘despite the court’s order,’ census supervisors have told field workers to wrap up data collection,” Bloomberg reported.
The Associated Press (AP) reports that Koh was further pissed off after she asked for records concerning this new “target date” but was then told by government attorneys that, oh, well, there’s not really a paper trail concerning this change, thanks. “A one sentence tweet?” Koh replied according to the AP. “Are you saying that is enough reason to establish decision-making? A one sentence tweet?” Sadly, apparently so these days, your honor.
The Trump administration had already begun appealing Koh’s order last week blocking the rush to end counts early on Sept. 30, and “against the judgment of the bureau’s own expert staff and in the middle of a pandemic,” Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law said. Koh had also stopped officials’ attempt to rush completed population numbers to impeached president Donald Trump by the end of the year.
But obviously displeased by a court order that would result in fairer representation in the census count, the administration has apparently decided to weasel itself into a new date not much different than the Sept. 30 date it was initially sued over in the first place. “The new Oct. 5 deadline doesn’t necessarily violate the judge’s order because the injunction just suspended the Sept. 30 deadline for field operations,” the AP said.
Oh, okay. Perhaps some more knowledgeable folks here can tell me if this has been blatant disregarding of a court order. Because it sure sounds like it, especially when the administration has already told the Supreme Court it can shove its decision on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Koh is now demanding officials hand over documentation regarding the Oct. 5 date by Tuesday at 1 PM ET, The Washington Post reports, with a hearing to follow at 6 PM ET.
Even if Koh blocks this new date—and she should—it’s so clear what’s behind it all here. The goal is to sabotage by all means, including creating confusion, an expert told The Washington Post.
“The confusion over when counting operations will end is making it difficult for hundreds of thousands of census ‘partners’ to plan final get-out-the-count activities,” census expert and Connecticut and Stamford Complete Count committees member Terri Ann Lowenthal said. “The constantly shifting plans and clear concern about the consequences for census accuracy already are undermining confidence in the results, even before there are any final numbers.”
It’s clear that’s always been the intention. We can’t let them get away with it. Complete the census today if you haven’t done so yet.