2020 Census

After a lower court ordered the Trump administration to continue counting for the 2020 census through Oct. 31, the Justice Department has asked the high court to allow it to end efforts soon.

A federal judge has ordered the Census Bureau to keep counting households for now after finding the agency violated an earlier order by tweeting a "target" end date of Oct. 5.

The abrupt addition of appointees at a federal statistical agency largely run by career civil servants has raised concerns about political interference with the 2020 census.

A Trump administration request to suspend a lower court order that extends the census schedule has been denied by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

A day after the Census Bureau tweeted out a new "target date" of Oct. 5 for ending 2020 census counting, a federal judge in California said she thinks the schedule change may violate a court order.

Curtailing the time for conducting the census in the middle of a pandemic will lead to "fatal data quality flaws that are unacceptable," Census Bureau career officials warned in an internal document.

Because of COVID-19, the Trump administration said it needed more time to make sure the national head count is complete and accurate. But in July, it abruptly decided to end counting a month early.

After the Trump administration missed a filing deadline for court documents, a judge has ordered the wrap-up of the census to remain on hold, throwing door-knocking efforts further into uncertainty.

The administration is trying to overturn a court ruling in New York that blocks it from trying to omit unauthorized immigrants from the census numbers used to reallocate seats in Congress.

A bipartisan Senate bill could solve a scheduling conundrum that is putting the national count, along with the distribution of federal funding and political representation, in serious jeopardy.