Thread: Census survey has something to rile everyone

Census survey has something to rile everyone

Updated 3m ago
By Haya El Nasser, USA TODAY

Some advocacy groups demand that illegal immigrants not be counted. Another urges a boycott. Others say they just won't answer some questions.

Republican fundraisers use it to attract donations. Some want criminals serving time elsewhere to be counted in their hometowns.

This intense special-interest brawl can mean only one thing: It's Census time.

More than six months before the 2010 Census begins, the level of emotion and commotion over whom the government should count and what questions should be asked has already reached a fever pitch.

"Census is a magnet for policy and political controversy," says Terri Ann Lowenthal, a consultant for groups that rely on Census data.

The Constitution requires a complete population count every 10 years to redraw political boundaries and apportion states' representation in the U.S. House of Representatives. Federal laws require the Census Bureau to collect data on everything from race to gender — information Uncle Sam uses to decide who gets $400 billion a year in federal aid.

"Every Census has its controversy because the stakes are so high," says Steve Jost, Census associate communications director. "We're up to the challenge."

Census Director Robert Groves told a House committee Tuesday he's worried the poor economy and tensions over immigration will deter people from participating in next year's count.


INTERACTIVE GRAPHIC: Census Bureau's 2008 American Community Survey

Among the disputes:

• Some Latino groups for the first time are urging people to refuse to fill out the Census form unless Congress helps an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants gain legal status. A boycott would mark a major break for most minority groups that traditionally urge everyone to participate to increase their numbers and gain political and financial clout.

"There is no way (Congress and governors) can come back next year to the Latino community and try again to seek our vote if they don't deliver comprehensive immigration reform," says the Rev. Miguel Rivera, head of the National Coalition of Latino Clergy & Christian Leaders, who is leading the proposed boycott.

• Efforts are underway to require that only citizens be counted for the purpose of apportionment. Supporters, including Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, who introduced legislation last week, say including non-citizens gives more seats to high-immigration states. The 2010 Census will not ask citizenship status.

"Only seven (high-immigration) states are winning on this deal," says Elliott Stonecipher, a Louisiana demographer and pollster who says only the number of citizens should determine political representation. "Everyone else gets hurt."

• Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., said she would not tell the Census anything more than the number of people in her household because other questions are unconstitutional. She says she is working on legislation to ensure a full count "without violating Americans' privacy."

• A "2010 Republican National Committee Census Document Questionnaire" that resembles a Census form actually is an opinion survey mailed to party members to solicit donations.

"The only aim of this document is to gather Republican opinion from across the country and raise money," says Gail Gitcho, Republican National Committee spokeswoman.

The Southeastern Legal Foundation, an Atlanta-based group that advocates limited government, and Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Ga., are sending out a "Census Defense Form" to raise money to fight what they call "Obama's dangerous plans to rig it against conservatives."

Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., member of a House Census subcommittee, says there were similar mailings in 2000, but "arguments are now much more extreme. We now have people saying that a settled area of constitutional law, that the Census must count every person in the country, is somehow fake."

• The Census Bureau severed ties with ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), a national group that had been one of 80,000 unpaid partners to help the agency promote participation. The relationship was attacked by conservatives, including Fox News talk show host Glenn Beck. The House voted last week to cut all federal funding to the group after ACORN employees were caught on video advising a couple posing as a pimp and prostitute how to lie about their jobs and hide earnings.

• The Census Bureau will continue to count prisoners as residents of the states where they are incarcerated. Civil rights groups such as the non-profit Prison Policy Initiative say the practice benefits rural districts where many prisons are based because inmates can't vote but are counted as constituents.

The Census counts people where they eat and sleep most of the time. "How much less political can you get than that?" Lowenthal asks.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/cen ... mess_N.htm

The Census counts people where they eat and sleep most of the time. "How much less political can you get than that?" Lowenthal asks.

What a stupid statement. So should I report all the illegals I have in my house on the census? Yes, because they eat and sleep here, or no because they will get representation without taxation and are not citizens. And this ain't political when our voting disticts get redrawn and our funding to help the poor unauthorized immigrants cost us all zillions annually.

Also. who cares if illegals boycott or not. They are not suppose to vote and the purpose of the census is for representation and voting and congressional seats. Also, for legal immigrants it will hurt.