{"id":2637115,"date":"2026-07-29T08:55:56","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T12:55:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncounting-noncitizens-in-the-census-undermines-american-democracy\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T09:05:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T13:05:08","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncounting-noncitizens-in-the-census-undermines-american-democracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncounting-noncitizens-in-the-census-undermines-american-democracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Counting Noncitizens In The Census Undermines US Democracy"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">16<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncounting-noncitizens-in-the-census-undermines-american-democracy%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2637115&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The article discusses concerns over noncitizens,<a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/illinois-expanding-taxpayer-funded-illegal-alien-healthcare-program\/\" title=\"Illinois Expanding Taxpayer-Funded ... Healthcare Program\">including illegal aliens<\/a>,being counted on the voter rolls and in the Census,which impacts election integrity and congressional apportionment. The Trump management identified approximately 250,000 noncitizens on voter rolls in four states, raising fears of voter fraud and advocating for efforts to remove ineligible voters. Additionally, there is a important threat posed by counting noncitizens in the Census, which influences the allocation of House seats, Electoral College votes, and federal funds. Historically, U.S. administrations have included noncitizens in population counts, with various policies and legal battles surrounding the issue. The Trump administration attempted to exclude noncitizens from the Census count to better reflect the American populace, but these <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/heres-how-biden-defied-the-supreme-court-to-cancel-144-billion-in-student-loans\/\" title=\"Discover how ... challenged the Supreme Court&#039;s decision by canceling 4 billion in student loans\">efforts faced legal challenges<\/a> and were ultimately reversed under President Biden. The article advocates for finalizing policies to exclude noncitizens from the Census for fair political representation, emphasizing the importance of ensuring only Americans are counted in apportionment processes.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The Trump administration\u2019s finding that some 250,000 noncitizens reside on the voter rolls of just four states \u2014 California, Nevada, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania \u2014 represents a clear and present danger to the integrity of our elections. Revelations from Democrat Gov. Mikie Sherrill of a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/new-jersey-dem-govs-blame-game-backfires-tech-company-pins-noncitizen-voter-registration-state\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">purported<\/a> Garden State \u201cglitch\u201d accounting for 6,600 noncitizen registered voters, hundreds of whom illegally cast ballots, further confirm the danger and vindicate the administration\u2019s vigorous effort to obtain and review every state\u2019s voter records to identify ineligible voters and compel states to remove them.<\/p>\n<p>But the revelations also ought to turn America\u2019s attention to a related threat: \u00a0the counting of noncitizens in the Census, which distorts congressional apportionment and the allocation of Electoral College votes for presidential elections. The threat is one the administration may be preparing to confront head-on.<\/p>\n<p>At the end of June, the Census Bureau proposed a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reginfo.gov\/public\/do\/eoDetails?rrid=1442165\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">rule<\/a> for addressing this threat. The Office of Management and Budget Review rule titled \u201cDecennial Census of the Population of Americans; Proposed Residence Criteria and Proposed Regulations for Demographic Questions\u201d has neither been published nor finalized. But we got a hint as to what it might entail based on the administration\u2019s correspondence with the plaintiffs in a <a href=\"https:\/\/storage.courtlistener.com\/recap\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957.1.0.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">case<\/a> brought by the state of Missouri. The Show Me State, like the states of Louisiana, Kansas, Ohio, and West Virginia in separate <a href=\"https:\/\/vhdshf2oms2wcnsvk7sdv3so.blob.core.windows.net\/thearp-media\/documents\/LA_625-cv-76_1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">litigation<\/a>, has challenged the Census Bureau\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/content\/dam\/Census\/programs-surveys\/decennial\/2020-census\/2020-Census-Residence-Criteria.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Residence Criteria<\/a> rule.  The rule governed the 2020 Census, codifying the counting of <em>all<\/em> people where they usually reside \u2014 including illegal aliens and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/follow-the-money-why-foreign-influence-on-university-campuses-is-a-threat-to-national-security\/\" title=\"Follow The Money: Why Foreign Influence On University Campuses Is A Threat To National Security\">temporary visa holders<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Among other things, the plaintiffs have called on the courts to hold unlawful and set aside that Residence Criteria rule. In response, the Trump administration, in calling for a stay of Missouri\u2019s case, <a href=\"https:\/\/storage.courtlistener.com\/recap\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957.74.0_1.pdf#page=4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">asserted<\/a> that the new proposed rule \u201cencompasses various policy positions for the 2030 Census\u201d and \u201cis expected to bear directly on the issues presented in this case\u201d \u2014 alluding to the issue of illegal aliens\u2019 inclusion in the Census.<\/p>\n<p>Continued inclusion of noncitizens in the Census would mean that millions of illegal aliens and temporary visa holders would continue to distort Americans\u2019 political representation by skewing the allocation of House seats and presidential electors, along with the distribution of trillions of dollars in federal funds. Even if the states purge every illegal alien from the voter rolls tomorrow, this foreign interference, which directly affects the voting power and political power of every single American, will persist absent executive action.<\/p>\n<p>The counting of noncitizens in the constitutional enumeration and apportionment process, like the entry of noncitizens on the voter rolls, is a consequence of mass illegal immigration and cynical political moves designed to incorporate said migrants into America and normalize their presence in advance of mass amnesty. Such moves have ranged from sanctuary policies to efforts to obstruct and eliminate immigration enforcement altogether. <\/p>\n<p>They also include gifting noncitizens a variety of benefits, from food stamps to health care to the right to vote in local elections. Illegal aliens ended up on the voter rolls, and thereby able to cast ballots in New Jersey, as a direct result of the extension of another such benefit: driver\u2019s licenses. The process of obtaining a driver\u2019s license is inextricably linked to voter registration since the passage of the 1993 federal \u201cMotor Voter\u201d law. From at least the Carter administration onward, as the illegal alien population <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bls.gov\/opub\/mlr\/1986\/09\/rpt2full.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">surged<\/a>, presidents have likewise intentionally granted them and other noncitizens an undue benefit: power over our entire system of government, starting with the political map, through inclusion in the Census.<\/p>\n<p>The Constitution\u2019s enumeration clause, amended by Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, calls for the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.congress.gov\/crs_external_products\/R\/PDF\/R45951\/R45951.10.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">apportioning<\/a> of House seats \u201camong the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed.\u201d By law, every 10 years the Census Bureau carries out the population count, the Commerce secretary provides the apportionment figures to the president, and the president transmits the apportionment figures with the associated allocation of House seats by state to Congress. <\/p>\n<p>By practice, as detailed in a <a href=\"https:\/\/storage.courtlistener.com\/recap\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957.1.0.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">lawsuit<\/a> brought by the State of Missouri and other plaintiffs challenging this policy, the Carter administration explicitly sought to include such aliens in the population count for 1980 \u2014 deeming it a constitutional imperative to do so. <a href=\"https:\/\/law.justia.com\/cases\/federal\/district-courts\/FSupp\/486\/564\/1753930\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Among other things<\/a>, the Carter administration created a bilingual questionnaire, launched a PR campaign to drive up response rates and assure respondents of confidentiality, and even \u201cconvinced the Immigration and Naturalization Service to curtail its law enforcement activities around census day,\u201d according to President Ronald Reagan\u2019s second Census Bureau director.<\/p>\n<p>The practice would persist in future administrations until Trump I, when the president took executive action aimed at identifying the illegal alien population in the Census and excluding it from the apportionment base.<\/p>\n<p>Litigants would challenge these efforts all the way up to the Supreme Court \u2014 which ended up <a href=\"https:\/\/www.supremecourt.gov\/opinions\/20pdf\/20-366_7647.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">declining<\/a> to rule on the merits of the case. In doing so, it declined to say whether \u201cthe whole number of persons in each state\u201d must or may include all peoples irrespective of immigration status, and whether the president had the authority to modify the apportionment base accordingly. Nor did the Supreme Court take up the <a href=\"https:\/\/docs.house.gov\/meetings\/GO\/GO00\/20200729\/110948\/HHRG-116-GO00-Wstate-EastmanJ-20200729.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">argument<\/a> that the Constitution is for the American political community, and that those who are not party to that compact or the American political community have no right to affect the distribution of House seats \u2014 and by extension the relative weight of Americans\u2019 votes.<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, the Trump administration ran out of time. The Biden administration rescinded its policies and apportioned House seats using figures that included the illegal alien and temporary visa holder populations. As a consequence, <a href=\"https:\/\/storage.courtlistener.com\/recap\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957\/gov.uscourts.moed.225957.1.0.pdf#page=29\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">analysis<\/a> presented by Missouri indicates that it, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Michigan were robbed of one House seat each, while California was apportioned three more seats than it should have received, and New York and Texas one seat apiece. This is to say nothing on the effect of intrastate redistricting, which is generally based on the illegal alien-inclusive population figures tabulated by the Census Bureau.<\/p>\n<p>Now, the Trump administration may be reprising the fight to ensure that the political map represents only Americans \u2014 and to deny the open borders crowd the disproportionate political power it has accrued primarily in blue jurisdictions through welcoming and harboring illegal aliens en masse.<\/p>\n<p>As reported in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.realclearinvestigations.com\/articles\/2025\/06\/26\/who_counts_trump_poised_to_try_to_remove_noncitizens_from_census_1118884.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">RealClearInvestigations<\/a> last year, the first hint of this willingness to fight may have come when White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/EfWB4YMJF3U?t=289\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">stated<\/a> that the administration was determined \u201cto clean up the census and make sure that illegal aliens are not counted.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Last August, President Trump seemed to suggest his administration was devising plans to exclude illegal aliens from the apportionment base, <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/114987220997209419\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">declaring<\/a> on Truth Social that \u201cPeople who are in our Country illegally WILL NOT BE COUNTED IN THE CENSUS.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Then, as detailed in <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/02\/17\/trump-admin-fights-to-keep-illegal-immigrants-from-distorting-census\/\">The<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/02\/17\/trump-admin-fights-to-keep-illegal-immigrants-from-distorting-census\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"> <\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/02\/17\/trump-admin-fights-to-keep-illegal-immigrants-from-distorting-census\/\">F<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/02\/17\/trump-admin-fights-to-keep-illegal-immigrants-from-distorting-census\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">ederalist<\/a> in February, the Trump Census Bureau indicated its intent to include a citizenship question in census testing in advance of the 2030 survey \u2014 a query that could be used to separate citizens from noncitizens in apportionment. The test that the Census Bureau employed was simply to use the long-form survey that the bureau regularly issues to smaller samples of the populace. Yet the administration\u2019s decision to do so in connection with 2030 Census testing sparked outrage \u2014 just as it did when the first administration tried to reinstate the citizenship question on the 2020 Census. The second Trump administration was unbowed, proceeding with plans, and issuing a <a href=\"https:\/\/omb.report\/icr\/202601-0607-004\/doc\/167846901\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">perfunctory response<\/a> in official documentation to the adversarial public comments it received.<\/p>\n<p>The Trump administration should push forward and finalize a rule excluding noncitizens from the Census, taking all necessary action to ensure that to the greatest extent possible, the next Census \u2014 which its successor will ultimately oversee \u2014 is carried out to benefit the American people. That starts with ensuring that the apportionment base, which exists to distribute Americans\u2019 political power via the allocation of their representatives, only includes Americans.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Ben Weingarten is editor at large for RealClearInvestigations. He is a senior contributor to The Federalist, columnist at Newsweek, and a contributor to the New York Post and Epoch Times, among other publications. Subscribe to his newsletter at weingarten.substack.com, and follow him on Twitter: @bhweingarten.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Trump admin warns of 250,000 noncitizens on voter rolls<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":698,"featured_media":2637116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Copy-of-Untitled-2026-07-28T161947.102.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33651],"tags":[58162,3813,13833,58940,32570],"class_list":["post-2637115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-western-journal","tag-census-2","tag-immigration","tag-noncitizens","tag-us-democracy","tag-voting-rights"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Copy-of-Untitled-2026-07-28T161947.102.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/698"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2637115"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2637119,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637115\/revisions\/2637119"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2637116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2637115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2637115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2637115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}