BREAKING: President Trump is expected to announce he is backing down from his effort to include a citizenship question on the 2020 census, and will instead instruct the Commerce Department to get the data through other means, sources tell ABCPolitics
The expected announcement would bring to a close weeks of escalating confusion within the government over his demands that the controversial question be included in the census despite a Supreme Court order that had blocked the move. The White House declined to comment about what exactly the president plans to announce.As recently as Thursday morning, administration officials had been repeatedly suggested the president would take executive action calling for the question be added to the census.
In a majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that the administration's previous stated reasoning that it wanted the question added to better enforce the Voting Rights Act,"seems to have been contrived." However, Roberts also left open the possibility that the question could still be added if the administration presented a rationale that was sufficient.
But they reversed course after President Trump tweeted that his administration was"absolutely moving forward" with efforts to include the question, sending DOJ lawyers scrambling to work up a new strategy that they could argue in the ongoing New York, Maryland and California cases. In an interview with the Associated Press earlier this week, Attorney General Bill Barr expressed confidence the administration had a legal path to still add the question, and disputed that the swap was a result of any internal objections expressed by the previous legal team.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Trump to announce action over census citizenship question -sourceU.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday will announce an executive action over h...
Read more »
Trump's blocking of Twitter critics unconstitutional: U.S. appeals courtA federal court in Manhattan said the First Amendment forbids Trump from using Twitter’s blocking function to limit access to his account, which has 61.8 million followers
Read more »
U.S. to probe French plan to tax tech companies: sourceU.S. President Donald Trump will order an investigation into France's plann...
Read more »
U.S. appeals court hands win to Trump in hotel 'emoluments' casePresident Donald Trump scores a crucial victory in a Democratic-backed lawsuit that accused him of violating anti-corruption provisions of the U.S. Constitution with his Washington hotel. More here:
Read more »
What’s the big deal about adding a citizenship question to U.S. Census?U.S. President Donald Trump is making a last-ditch push to add a citizenship que...
Read more »
Support for Donald Trump prompts calls for Home Depot boycott
Read more »