Chief Justice Roberts Joins Liberal Justices to Block Census Citizenship Question

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The administration of President Donald Trump wanted to include a basic citizenship question as part of the once-a-decade census, but the Supreme Court of the United States ruled the administration’s justification for including the question as ‘insufficient.’

However, they didn’t rule against it outright. Instead, they have sent the issue back to the lower courts for further consideration. Still, being that the census year is coming up in a matter of months, getting the question approved by courts in time for the forms to be printed is unlikely.

So, President Trump is now teasing that the census could be delayed, giving them more time to see the case through.

From Fox News:

Trump raised the possibility of a delay until a final resolution by the courts. In a fiery Twitter response to the narrow ruling, Trump said it “seems totally ridiculous” for the government not to ask such a “basic question.”

“I have asked the lawyers if they can delay the Census, no matter how long, until the … United States Supreme Court is given additional information from which it can make a final and decisive decision on this very critical matter,” he said.

Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the four liberal justices on the bench, adding to his record of occasionally breaking important ties in favor of the Left. Roberts infamously bent over backwards to justify the constitutionality of Obamacare and the individual mandate.

Again, at issue was the authority of the Secretary of Commerce, Wilbur Ross, to request the question’s inclusion, not necessarily the merit of including the question in general. Opponents of the citizenship question argue that it will lead to an under-counting of population, especially in urban areas with lots of illegal immigrants, by as many as 6.5 million. That, they say, would effect the number of representatives apportioned to the states based on population.

A state like California, for example, wants to count as many warm bodies as possible in order to maximize the number of Representatives it can send to congress. But representation based on populations, regardless of how many are in the country illegally, would grant political rights to people who…are in the country illegally. Since when does an illegal immigrant afford themselves representation in congress?

There did indeed use to be a citizenship question of sorts on the census questionnaire, but not since 1950. Then the question asked if the individual was born in the United States, and if not, had they been naturalized. It appears imminently eminently reasonable for a government to know how many of the people residing within its borders are citizens or otherwise, but the issue has been turned into a tool the Left uses to ascribe racist motives to immigration hawks and those genuinely interested in the extent of illegal populations in the country.

You can read much more on the background of this case, and possible paths forward for the Trump administration, at Fox News.