Census: Why don't we all just boycott the citizenship question? (assuming there is one)

[OrwellwasRight]

Seriously, if there were a national boycott movement, then non-citizens would not feel so awkward filling out the form, so more would fill it out, so we'd get a more accurate count. And yes, you have to fill out the census to comply with the law, but what are they going to do if millions of people skip just one question?

[zaj]

1. Terrible idea

You magnifying the gerrymandering by doing that.

That's the reason for the question to begin with.

[OrwellwasRight]

7. Actually, districts are based on population, not citizenship.

Boycotting one question rather than the whole census would not affect gerrymandering or redistricting at all. They would get an accurate population count and there would be too many blank answers to draw any conclusions about citizenship.

[sandensea]

23. +1

You, good sir, are a genius.

If Cheeto and Rosschild get their way with the citizenship question, I certainly hope your idea catches on - big time.

[OrwellwasRight]

27. Thanks!

[ripcord]

85. But it could affect funding

If a citizenship question is on the census and hardly anyone identifies as a non citizen any funding to assist immigrants could be cut as unnecessary and used in other areas.

[OrwellwasRight]

88. Given that there has been no citizenship question on the census for 70 years,

what funding are you referring to that is based on that answer?

Most federal services where citizenship is even relevant, it is because immigrants are not eligible (e.g., ACA, legal aid), not because they get extra. Many services are based on income level--e.g., Title I education funding, community services block grants. Others are based on total population.

More here: https://www.gao.gov/assets/120/118299.pdf

[struggle4progress]

2. I think this is a good idea

[OrwellwasRight]

28. Thanks!

[Sneederbunk]

3. While we are at it, we could boycott the race question too.

[OnDoutside]

4. Actually that's probably a better idea, mass refusal to answer that particular question.

[OrwellwasRight]

8. Actually data on race

helps pinpoint disparities that need to be remedied. I think it is important to have data about the racial makeup of poor versus wealthier neighborhoods, school districts, who is closer/farther from public services, etc. But it is clear this citizenship question is designed to suppress overall responsiveness to the census and thereby create an undercount in urban (Democratic) areas. So that is why I would boycott that question.

[samnsara]

77. i may forget to answer the citizenship ? but Im choosing 'hispanic' as race..

[beachbum bob]

5. I guess I am among few around here that have a problem with people being in this country

illegally? I have several friends who spent the money and followed the process to get there US citizenship done the legal way

[RKP5637]

6. Yep, I think of that too. n/t

[OrwellwasRight]

9. Right, but the citizenship question

doesn't ask if you are documented -- it just asks if you are a citizen. Many legal immigrants are not citizens. Some of them may not wish to answer either as they may be afraid it makes them a target. The Trump administration has deported documented immigrants, not just the undocumented ones. The census is about getting an accurate count of people -- human beings -- not about anything else.

[customerserviceguy]

10. Count me as one who agrees with you

And the people who say it's OK to ask about race, but not about citizenship seem silly to me.

[JustAnotherGen]

14. Of course it does

[Raine]

17. I'm with you on this.. nt

[ExciteBike66]

53. Your friends have citizenship and the "illegals" you are so worried about do not.

Looks like your friends' money was worth it.

[Takket]

54. The problem is the citizenship question

Undermines the entire point of the census which is to make an accurate count of how many people are here.

[Mariana]

60. This census question does not address that in any way

since it doesn't ask whether non-citizens are here legally.

[a la izquierda]

75. Tell that to the transgender folks...

Waiting to get asylum, then being deported and murdered in their home countries.
Do tell them they should wait the “right way.”

I’m sure the kids trying to escape gangs, violence and starvation would appreciate your lecture as well.

Try not to cheer too loudly when trump begins deporting people by the thousands, as he has threatened to do.
I hope you like expensive produce.

[jberryhill]

11. Why didn't we all simply not elect a moron?

Why don’t we all elect a majority D Senate?

Any plan which relies, as a key element, upon “and then I get a couple million people to do the same thing” is going to run into some practical difficulties.

[OrwellwasRight]

12. Actually, that's not the case.

"A couple million people" do the same thing all the time. However, one post in DU won't make it happen. I'll give you that. However, a citizenship question boycott is a lot more likely than going back in time and re-electing a different president or Senate.

[samnsara]

78. both my state senators are D ( and women!)

...and we didnt elect tRump...they (those people) and Russia did...

[FBaggins]

13. They'll knock on the door

The maximum penalty IIRC is just $100... but they would probably consider that sufficient to fund the knocking.

[OrwellwasRight]

24. They may knock

But likely they will be happy just to get the form back -- blank questions not withstanding. I doubt there much if any budget for enforcement. Funny thing is, some of the least likely to answer are the far right wingers who don't believe in the federal government at all.

[Mariana]

36. Yeah, my father refused to answer anything except to say

"Two people live here." in 2010. Obama was president, you see, that's why my dad wouldn't tell them anything else. I reminded him that just about everything else they wanted to know is a matter of public record, and the census workers would just get the information by looking it up.

[MichMan]

52. Doesn't the government already know who is a citizen?

[Mariana]

57. Not necessarily.

The federal government doesn't keep birth records, for example, and birth certificates aren't public records in most states. By "public record" I was talking about name, address, age, etc. - the basic stuff they ask on the census that my dad didn't tell them. When he refused to give the names of the residents in his house, those names are very easy to find.

Citizenship and immigration data has been collected on US censuses before. Place of birth (state or country) was asked from 1850 to 1940 (maybe after that, too, but those aren't publicly available). The 1870, 1900, 1910, 1920, and 1930 had varying questions about citizenship status and/or immigration information, and again, it may have been done after that, too.

[TreasonousBastard]

15. Nothing. While some of the Census surveys are mandatory...

it is not required to answer all of the questions.

[OrwellwasRight]

25. +1

My point exactly. I say the boycott is on.

[JustAnotherGen]

16. I had already planned on it

I'm not answering the question. They can arrest me.

[dixiegrrrrl]

18. Kudos to you.

I understand exactly, and feel the same way.

I am gonna hope they miss our house again this year. Last census, we got nothing..no mail, no door knocking, nothing.

" I never knew there was a house back here" is something I hear a lot. Now I am banking on it.

We have several black families in the neighborhood and I would love to have them all declare they are white on the form.

Think about that for a second.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

30. Really? You are happy not to be counted?

You are happy with gerrymandering, I hope.

Oh, and you can put down whatever you want on the race/ethnicity question. I'm a boring white person myself, so in certain ways that question doesn't impact me. At some point in the distant future that question will probably go away, but we live in a society where race and ethnicity matter in many ways. Choosing not to identify with your actual race/ethnicity strikes me as a poor idea. But what do I know?

[dixiegrrrrl]

41. We have already discovered the Repubs want that question for nefarious purposes.

Why on earth would I give them them more ammo to steal votes?
why would anyone go along with their no longer secret plan to steal votes to keep themselves in power?

FWIW, I am so damn white I am almost translucent, but I woke up in 68, and damned if I am going to stop saying NO to bigotry in any form at this late date.
It's pretty simple. You can say NO or you can be a collaborator.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

43. If you don't answer it, you might be counted as a non citizen. Which feeds much more

into their agenda than answering it.

[OrwellwasRight]

46. No, if you don't answer the question, they don't know if you are a citizen or not.

Which makes it harder to target people for extradition. But you do fill out the census and mail it in, so you are counted as a person.

The census counts population for the purpose of redistricting. It does not count citizens for the purpose of redistricting and never has. They can't change the basis of the districts by asking a new census question. See Article !, Section 2 of the Constitution. It references "persons" not citizens.

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript

[dixiegrrrrl]

65. "Really? You are happy not to be counted?"

Skipping The 2020 Census Citizenship Question? You'll Still Be Counted
https://www.npr.org/2018/04/19/603629576/skipping-the-2020-census-citizenship-question-youll-still-be-counted

[Captain Zero]

33. Really think about it, blank on the citizenship question and white on race, everybody

Thats the way to get funds allocated equally and gerry mandering stopped since they don't have the data to mis-draw the lines.

[dixiegrrrrl]

37. We have about a 45 black/ 50% white race split where I live.

And turnout has never been really heavy usually. till last year., when a whole bunch of dem votes came out of god knows where and elected Doug Jones, even in our county.
I have a feeling it will be heavy next year, too.

but the Repubs rule the area, always have. The only hope is a political change which addresses all the voting ills that have stacked up.

[former9thward]

21. Sorry to disappoint you.

They will not arrest you. They will not fine you. They will not threaten you. They don't care. I worked on many Census projects 2009-2015. They use statistical models to make up for non-compliance.

[JustAnotherGen]

49. Not disappointed

It should be knowledge everyone uses.

Thank you - simply don't answer the question.

I intend to make my non compliance a feature of my County Clerk campaign.

She who owns the polls in NJ has all the power.

[former9thward]

50. Good luck on your election!

[JustAnotherGen]

58. Thank you

If not me - then there is another insurgent spirit on deck. Our district flipped in 2018 after 38 years of a GOP member of Congress on a few key issues ASIDE from Health Care -

States Rights
Grievance Politics towards 'welfare states'
Disgust with racism
And once again -States Rights


We can take that seat if we act like County Clerks in the South in the 1950's . . .

Little black lady me, or little Jewish lady she. One or the other - NJ is going to do whatever it wants.

[OrwellwasRight]

29. Right on.

Me too.

[Norbert]

56. People turm im incomplete census forms all the time

through not understanding the question or an oversight.

If people get arrested for not answering a question on the census form we will bring prison overcrowding to a whole new level.

For the record, I won't answer the citizenship question.

[JustAnotherGen]

59. It really isn't an offense

But what if we planted the seed in our two Assembly Districts (state) that sit within our Legislative District.

We did in 2017. It's solid individual states right / individual rights area of NJ.

[Tanuki]

19. I have no intention of answering that question, even though I am a citizen

The intentions behind adding that question are despicable and they can fine me if they want.

[OrwellwasRight]

22. Ditto!

[mcar]

20. Makes sense to me

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

31. I worked for the census in 2010.

I was in an office where we reviewed the forms that were sent in. Really interesting.

All of you who don't think you should answer any one question on the form, please take a job with the census. I mean it. You will learn a lot.

You'll see people who scribble on the form, "I'm not filling this out! It's UNCONSTITUTIONAL!!!" And then they get someone who has the joy of going door to door to try to get the information. Oh, and it's actually in the Consititution.

At the risk of repeating myself, please take a job with the census this coming year. You'll learn a lot.

[OrwellwasRight]

34. I have always filled out the census.

I'm not an Amon Bundy follower. The point is this question is illegitimate. It exists to drive down responses from the immigrant community, so that Republicans can continue to game districts and elections in this country. No one should help the Republicans by answering it. And it might make immigrants feel more comfortable responding to the survey, thus driving up census completion in general except for the illegitimate question.

[susanr516]

32. I said early on I would refuse to answer the question

It's never been on the questionnaire before. I'm a senior citizen. Why should I suddenly have to answer it now?

[OrwellwasRight]

35. Exactly.

[live love laugh]

38. I wish...there really are too many who don't understand why they should boycott

Sadly 😞.

[Ms. Toad]

40. nose, spite, face

Generally doesn't turn out well.

How do you think they would count the millions of democrats who don't answer the question? Likely as non-citizens. That even more dramatically shift the population (for purposes of redistricting) to republicans areas than they are counting on by merely discouraging non-citizens from participating would.

[live love laugh]

42. The counting of citizens or non-citizens has never been a factor in redistricting.

I think your assumptions are unfounded.

[Ms. Toad]

61. You're not paying attention to current political intelligence -

That is precisely what The republican operatives intended to advocate for.

We initially thought they merely intended to diminish turnout in populaions likely to be democratic. But more recent intelligence is that they wanted to redistrict based on citizens, not populations. The first step to that is gathering the data.

[OrwellwasRight]

45. That's not how the census works. It counts population, not citizens.

Here is just one U.S. government site confirming that districts are based on population, not citizenship.

https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/congressional-districts-277f7

[Ms. Toad]

62. That is not how it has worked in the past.

The republican scheme was to change that and redistrict on citizens, not population.

You must have missed the recent discussions revealing the even more vile plan than merely suppresing non-ctizen turn-out.

[OrwellwasRight]

67. Actually, districts based on population is exactly how it has worked in the past.

And no, I didn't miss the conversations. My idea would prevent them from following through. If they don't know who is and who isn;t a citizen, they don't have the data to execute their plan. Go back and read it again.

[Ms. Toad]

74. That was a fairly obvious typo in my caption.

And if you dont answer the question, you will not be counted as a citizen by states that redistrict based on citizenship. They are not going to just toss the question, any more than they have tossed any other non-answer on census forms in the past.

[OrwellwasRight]

47. Yes, I'm shocked at the number of DUers

who don't seem to understand why we need to stand in solidarity with our immigrant brothers and sisters, who don't understand the difference between boycotting a question and boycotting the who census, and who think that redistricting counts only citizens and not the whole population.

[Ms. Toad]

39. The millions of people are likely to be Democrats

Play that out through redistricting and you get dramatically higher population in Republican areas, giving them more seats in the next (already gerrymandered) districts.

NOT a smart idea - it makes the shift they were hoping for when they pushed to add this question even worse.

[OrwellwasRight]

44. That's not how the census works.

They don't "not count you" just because you leave one question blank. So how exactly would refusing to say if you were a citizen boost the Republican population?

[Ms. Toad]

63. The repubican scheme is not only to depress cooperation -

but also to change/advocate for changing the basis of redistricting:

The Trump administration believes its proposed question about citizenship on the 2020 Census will help states that want to draw citizens-only voting districts in the next round of redistricting by providing the first comprehensive data on non-citizens in about 70 years, according to a Reuters review of court and federal register documents and interviews with more than a dozen state lawmakers

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-census-redistricting-insight/republicans-want-census-data-on-citizenship-for-redistricting-idUSKCN1RK18D

[OrwellwasRight]

66. A) They can't draw citizen-only voting districts

Last edited Wed Jun 19, 2019, 09:46 AM - Edit history (1)

if we don't answer the question; and
B) They may be able to draw citizen-only voting districts if the Supreme Court says they can, but it has not decided the question. That is historically not how it was done. So in addition to a legal strategy, boycotting the question deprives them of the data they need to gerrymander effectively. [Corrected]


That's the reason for the boycott. Without the citizenship info, their plan is thwarted. So what you say you are worried about is exactly what my idea addresses...

[Ms. Toad]

73. If you don't answer the question,

they will assume you are a non-citizen. They are not going to just tsll the informaiton. That will shift citizen-based lines to heavily Republican - since they are the ones answering the question.

This will be the only data gathered for 10 years. You're wiling to risk the current Supreme Court ruling that there can be citizen-only districts, with no means to correctteh data on which those districts are based for a decade? In that decade (which can use citizen-based heavily Republican districts, likely with far less gerrymandering), how many more lopsided Congresses will be elected? How many more heavily Republican states will be granted additional seats? How many more Supreme Court Justices (and judges in lower courts) will be appointed - or Democtratically appointed judges refused to be confirmed - in that time period? Those are lifetime appointments - so even if the population-based representation is impaired only for a decade, the potential impact is far more serious and long-lasting.

[OrwellwasRight]

83. You still don't get it.

They cannot assume that the majority of the country is non-citizen. So if the majority of the census-respondents leave it blank, it will thwart their plans. It would be factually incorrect to assume the majority of the US population are non-citizens, so making such an assumption would be wrong and would undermine their aims.

Also, "heavily Republican states" won't get more seats. Seats are apportioned to states by population, period ("whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed," see Amendment XIV, Section 2).

All this question can do is determine district lines within states. And Republicans wi'll draw the district lines wrong if we refuse to cooperate. You're right that they want to make long-lasting change, so go ahead and cooperate in their plan by helping them get accurate data if you want to. I won't. Catch ya later.

[Ms. Toad]

90. The suggestion that the majority of the country would refuse to answer a census question

is not reality-based, especially when there is a $100 fine associated with failing to answer, and especially when you can peruse the discussions here and find DU who believe immigrants here without having gone through the proper channels should be shipped home and either not allowed to return or forced to stand in the proper line to be here. Individuals who believe the latter have no understanding of the broken immigration system in this country - but they likely include the majority of the US population, and I have certainly encountered them even on DU.

The participation rate would more likely be n the 1-2% range.

As for what the citizenship can facilitate - it will allow them to better gerrymander, which this will allow them to fine tune Republican gerrymandering in both state-level and federal-level representation. Even if they don't get more total seats for the state - it allows them to gerrymander more Republican seats within the state, which shfits the balance of power at the Federal level just as surely as (perhaps more surely than) apportionment.

[OrwellwasRight]

48. See also

the majority opinion in this case: https://www.oyez.org/cases/2015/14-940#!

[OrwellwasRight]

71. No...

I'm not saying boycott the census, just boycott the citizenship question. This means you'll still be counted. It would not create a population shift. It would provide incomplete data on citizenship to thwart their plans.

And please stop calling me "not smart". You've done it in several posts, and it is annoying.

[Ms. Toad]

72. So if the Republicans succeed in their plan

(which has been in the news within the last two weeks), not answering the citizenship question will likely result in treating you as a non-citizen. And, again, if the Republicans succeed in their plan - that will result in a significant shift to (Republican) citizens on which redistricting will be based.

The repubican scheme is not only to depress cooperation -

but also to change/advocate for changing the basis of redistricting:

The Trump administration believes its proposed question about citizenship on the 2020 Census will help states that want to draw citizens-only voting districts in the next round of redistricting by providing the first comprehensive data on non-citizens in about 70 years, according to a Reuters review of court and federal register documents and interviews with more than a dozen state lawmakers

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-census-redistricting-insight/republicans-want-census-data-on-citizenship-for-redistricting-idUSKCN1RK18D

Please provide a link to where I said you were not smart.

I'm pretty sure I've never called any person on DU "not smart." Ideas - even ideas proposed by the most brilliant people in the world can be not smart.

[OrwellwasRight]

84. Yes, that is their goal.

So we should deny them the data they need to achieve that goal. I don't see what is so "not smart" about this proposal.

In multiple posts, you called my ideas not smart. I don't have to be "brilliant" to understand your point. We all know how to follow DU rules, and we all know what each other really means, so spare me the defensiveness. This isn't about alerting on posts, it is about grappling with ideas instead of labeling them as "not smart" so that one doesn't actually have to open one's mind.

Which brings me to my point, which is that you still do not appear to comprehend my proposal. I am well aware of the Republicans' plans. Which is why I propose that we all cooperate to deny them the data to follow through on it. If the majority of people refuse to state whether they are citizens or not, no one will know exactly where the non-citizens are. Republicans will have to make guesses and they will make mistakes. And people will vote anyway in whatever district they are put in, and the results will not be what the Republicans expected. The census cannot deprive you of your voting rights. Nor can seats be taken away from states that actually do have a lot of immigrants (https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/amendments-11-27#toc-amendment-xiv). This is only about within state redistricting. If we can mess with their plan to try to draw citizens-only districts in the states they control, we should. Or we can help them find the immigrants by answering their damn citizenship question like good little girls and boys. I prefer the former.

[Ms. Toad]

89. I'm not defensive at all.

You accused me of doing something that had not even crossed my mind. I challenge ideas, I don't attack people. And, as I have said, the idea is not smart.

Your plan assumes that gerrymandered districts only impacts representation at the federal level; it doesn't. There are also gerrymandered districts within states. Refusal to disclose citizenship will tell the Republican lawmakers (who are already in charge of redistricting because of the last gerrymandered districts) precisely where the republican voters are - using answering that quesiton as a stand-in for republican. That allows them to better gerrymander those districts to ensure the Republicans remain in control. Once a district is gerrymandeed to permit Republicans will win, voter turnout matters far less because the district boundaries are drawn precisely to give a majority Republican vote in as many districts as can be rigged.

Denying them the data will not foil their plan - they will treat non-answers as non-citizens. And we will be stuck with that data - and the damage it does - for the next decade.

As for whether refusing to answer would impacts both the state and the federal level by impacting the number of seats assigned - that question remains open. In its last review of the matter, the Supreme Court expressly declined to answer the question of whether states could choose to draw (Federal House of Representative) district lines based solely on the voter-eligible population. Gerrymandering has at least as much, if not more, impact on representation in Congress than does apportionment.

[rainy]

51. I posted this question awhile back. Heard Thom Hartman

ask it of his guest while they were discussing the census😆

[OrwellwasRight]

69. That's good, but where's the call?

Why aren't these immigrants rights group on this and telling people to boycott.

[Pachamama]

55. Everyone should just participate and they can either leave that question blank

....or all say “Yes” they are citizens

[OrwellwasRight]

70. Could be.

I think many people would be more comfortable leaving it blank than lying though. And if only the non-citizens leave it blank, it is kind of a dead giveaway.

[Pachamama]

80. Imagine majority of people all just refuse to answer the question.....

They can't just conclude that if a question is left blank that they know the answer....or could they?

Would this be the first census where some questions were left blank?

[OrwellwasRight]

81. If the majority of all people didn't answer,

their conclusions would be wrong. Majority = more than half. And then--in R controlled states--people they didn't think could vote would vote in districts they would vote in, this thwarting their plans. In D controlled states, it would not make a difference. In terms of how many reps per state -- that would still be determined on the basis of population, as per the constitution and 2 USC 2a (a) (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/2/2a):

(a) On the first day, or within one week thereafter, of the first regular session of the Eighty-second Congress and of each fifth Congress thereafter, the President shall transmit to the Congress a statement showing the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed, as ascertained under the seventeenth and each subsequent decennial census of the population, and the number of Representatives to which each State would be entitled under an apportionment of the then existing number of Representatives by the method known as the method of equal proportions, no State to receive less than one Member.

There are always people who don't fill out some or all of the census. I'm talking about a concerted effort of civil disobedience to deny the administration illegitimate info they should not be collecting.

[Pachamama]

86. I guess the civil disobedience would likely come from people who are not Trump supporters....

I definitely wasn't suggesting not answering the Census-I was suggesting not answering the citizenship question and I guess with your point, that would most likely only happen in Democratic controlled states....but not necessarily. Alternatively, if everyone said they are an American citizen, would that be verified? Maybe by a knock on the door by a Census taker out to validate - but if that household doesn't answer the door - does the census get invalidated?

I was suggesting that if the census was filled out entirely, but no one or most left that question blank, it wouldn't invalidate the census - rather it would send a very clear message. I understand this would necessitate the Census Bureau to send out people to ALL the locations to verify and that would not be an easy task. Would this mean that those census questionnaires be invalidated? I highly doubt it. Then again, I don't even believe that a Census, even without that question, if run by the Trump Administration will be honestly tabulated.



Regardless - this Census is going to be a Clusterfuck and my guess another way the "R"s will take away more seats and power for themselves.

[OrwellwasRight]

87. Whether they got accurate data on that question or not would not invalidate the census.

I don't want to invalidate the census. The census is important. My point is to mess with their data on an illegitimate question. I just feel like people would be more comfortable leaving it blank rather than lying, but maybe people are happy to lie on federal forms these days -- what do I know?

The census is run by civil servants. Civil servants won't lie for Trump. There is no way for them to pretend more people live in R states than in D states unless people actually don't fill out the census at all, so boycotting the whole census isn't a great plan. It would help the Rs.

Seats are apportioned between states based on population, regardless of citizenship. It is only within states that the Rs could try to draw citizen only districts. I don't want to help them do that.

In terms of R and D controlled states, if there were a mass movement to boycott the question, the boycott would happen in all 50 states. Again, my point is that in D-controlled states, the legislatures would not try to draw district lines based on citizenship, so it would not matter there. And in the R-controlled states, they would have bad data, so it would thwart their efforts.

[edhopper]

64. You don't understand

nobody is compelled to answer that question.

The reason the GOP want it is to scare immigrants from answering the census at all.

I am sure they will propagandize in those communities that the census will lead to deportation.

The point is to under report immigrant populations and then get more "white" districts.

[OrwellwasRight]

68. O.M.G.

I DO understand.

By law, you have to complete the census (https://www.npr.org/2018/04/19/603629576/skipping-the-2020-census-citizenship-question-youll-still-be-counted). The law may not be enforced, but it is the law. Thus, most non-undocumented citizens do fill it out and do feel duty-bound to answer everything.

If there is a boycott movement, and few people or, ideally, no people answer that question, then there isn't accurate data on who is and who is not a citizen. So they can try to draw whatever districts they want, but those districts won't be right. And no one will lose their right to vote. So we live and vote where we are and their plans are thwarted. And they don't depress Latino responses because they people who don't want to respond out of fear of admitting they are non-citizens will have cover to answer the questions because everyone would have their backs. What in the world is so difficult about this concept.

[edhopper]

79. I agree with you

and that question should be boycotted.

I was explaining the GOP's ultimate goal with that question. To intimidate immigrants not to answer the census at all.

Then their populations are under reported.

The question should not be on the census, it's aim is to discriminate.

[OrwellwasRight]

82. And they would be more likely to fill it out

if they knew that leaving that question blank couldn't put them in danger because tens of millions of others would also leave it blank. It's called Solidarity, and it works.

[samnsara]

76. i plan on answering that i am hispanic