Citizenship question on U.S. Census would cause big Latino undercount: study

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

POLITICS MARCH 22, 2019 / 1:58 PM / UPDATED 26 MINUTES AGO

Citizenship question on U.S. Census would cause big Latino undercount: study

Nick Brown
3 MIN READ

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Trump administration’s proposal to ask a citizenship question on the 2020 U.S. census could lead to an undercount of some 4.2 million among Hispanics, costing their communities federal aid and political representation, according to a study by Harvard researchers released on Friday.

The study by the Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy is the first to assess the impact of the proposed question since U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced plans last year to reinstate it for the first time in more than half a century.

The study found the question could lead to census-takers missing between 3.9 million and 4.6 million Hispanics nationwide - or between 7.7 percent and 9.1 percent of the Hispanic population recorded in the last U.S. census, in 2010.

Demographers, data experts and even Census Bureau officials have said the question risks frightening immigrants into abstaining from the count in a climate of stepped-up immigration enforcement. Because decennial census data determines how congressional seats are apportioned - and how the U.S. government allocates $800 billion a year in federal aid - an undercount could prove disastrous in some communities.

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Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-census-undercount/citizenship-question-on-u-s-census-would-cause-big-latino-undercount-study-idUSKCN1R32BV

[Me.]

1. I Wonder If States Like Texas & Florida

would be the losers if the question is in the census