Federal Courts and Census

The Trump administration has revealed in a new regulatory filing that the Census Bureau’s 2026 field test for the 2030 census will include a question asking participants about their U.S. citizenship status, reviving a politically explosive issue just four years after the Supreme Court blocked a similar move for the 2020 count. The test, now limited to roughly 155,000 households in and around Huntsville, Ala., and Spartanburg, S.C., is formally billed as research and will not be used to redistribute House seats, but it comes as Trump and Republican lawmakers push openly to exclude some or all non‑citizens from the constitutional apportionment counts used for congressional and Electoral College representation. GOP‑led states have already filed lawsuits demanding that residents without legal status — and in Missouri’s case even people here on immigrant visas — be subtracted from those tallies, despite the 14th Amendment’s requirement to count the 'whole number of persons in each state.' The questionnaire, adapted from the American Community Survey, also asks about income sources, plumbing and sewer connections but notably does not incorporate the Biden‑era changes to race and ethnicity questions that would add 'Middle Eastern or North African' and 'Hispanic or Latino' checkboxes, changes Trump officials are considering rolling back. Census advocates warn on social media that inserting a citizenship question into field tests during a period of heightened immigration enforcement could depress participation among immigrants and mixed‑status families, laying the groundwork for a less accurate 2030 count and a partisan rewrite of political maps and federal funding flows.