Citizenship question on census barred for now

The Supreme Court split several different ways on Thursday as it ruled on the Trump administration’s plan to ask everyone in the nation next year about their citizenship. But in the end, a bare majority ruled that government officials must reconsider that plan, and do so in time for the 2020 census.

The main opinion, written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., declared that Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross had used a “contrived” explanation for adding that question to census forms, so it ordered Ross and his aides to examine the issue all over again.

The Justices appeared to assume that the Census Bureau has enough time to prepare for the census, even with the newly ordered review.

However, the Court’s action also appears to leave open two possibilities that could threaten to end the administration’s plan. One was the possibility that officials cannot find a convincing explanation for the plan that does not depend on the prior claim that citizenship data was needed in order to help the Justice Department in enforcing federal voting rights laws. Ross and government lawyers have depended on that rationale throughout the legal challenges to the plan, but the Court majority found it to be wanting.

The other possibility is that a question of racial bias as the true motive for asking the citizenship question is going to be explored anew by one, and probably two, lower courts, and that could turn out to be a serious threat to asking the question. The outcome, though, is likely to depend upon a return to the Supreme Court, either during its summer recess or in the early fall.

Much of the Roberts opinion was favorable toward the Commerce Secretary’s handling of the controversy, but it wound up concluding that all of the evidence on that dispute, when taken together, “tells a story that does not match the explanation the Secretary gave for his decision.”

Lyle Denniston has been writing about the Supreme Court since 1958. His work has appeared here since mid-2011.