Trump found a way to find out the citizenship of US residents without a census

US President Donald Trump rejected the idea of ​​including a citizenship question on the upcoming 2020 census. Instead, the head of the White House instructed the US Department of Commerce to collect all available information on this matter from other departments of the country.

Trump announced this in the White House Rose Garden on Thursday evening during a special press conference on census and citizenship issues. Along with the president, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and US Attorney General William Barr attended the announcement.

Two weeks ago, the Supreme Court ruled against introducing a new question into the census for the first time in 70 years. By five votes to four, the judges ruled that the reason stated by the administration for adding the issue of citizenship - the protection of voting rights - seems to be “far-fetched”.

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The decision states that the administration may offer other reasons, and Trump said last week that he was considering the possibility of introducing a new question by presidential decree.

Any presidential decree providing for unilaterally introducing a new issue is likely to provoke new lawsuits, since, in accordance with the Constitution, the census process is the responsibility of Congress, not the president.

However, a Harvard-Harris poll last month showed that, despite a possible defeat in court, Trump has enough political support for such an initiative. A survey among registered voters showed that twice as many respondents were in favor of submitting the issue of citizenship than against.

A census of the US population exceeding the 327 of millions of people is due to begin in April of the next year, and the questionnaires without a question about citizenship have already begun to be printed. In the United States, the census is important because its results determine the distribution of 435 seats in the House of Representatives by state, as well as the distribution of federal state aid.

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However, Democrats and organizations that advocate for the rights of immigrants, criticize Trump for trying to bring in the questionnaire on citizenship. Demographic specialists, including those from the Census Bureau, fear that stateless immigrants will not participate in the census for fear of being deported.

Democrats insist that, if immigrants are underestimated, then seats in the House of Representatives and federal aid can leave the cities sympathetic to democrats with large immigrant communities in areas where mostly Republicans live.

Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi described Trump's efforts with the phrase “Let's make America white again”, beating up his famous slogan “Let's make America great again”.

The Department of Justice, which deals with litigation related to citizenship issues, this week tried to change the entire team of lawyers after indignation of some of them, which they were required to continue to work on this case after the Supreme Court passed its decision.

However, two federal judges spoke out against the reshuffle in the legal team of the administration, saying that this could not be done without a satisfactory explanation of the reasons.