By MIKE SCHNEIDER, Associated Press
Voters in California and Texas affiliated with a Democratic group want to intervene in a lawsuit filed by four Republican state attorneys general that is attempting to exclude people in the U.S. illegally from numbers used to divvy up congressional seats among states.
The five voters said in a motion Monday that the state attorneys general’s lawsuit would harm them by taking away congressional representation and Electoral College votes from their states.
The lawsuit filed more than a week ago by the GOP attorneys general of Kansas, Louisiana, Ohio and West Virginia seeks to exclude people in the country illegally or temporarily from the numbers used to apportion congressional seats after each once-a-decade census.
The 14th Amendment states that “the whole number of persons in each state” should be counted for the numbers used for apportionment, the process of allocating congressional seats and Electoral College votes among the states, based on population.
The voters from California and Texas said in their motion that the 14th Amendment was “as clear as can be” that apportionment should be based on the count of all residents.
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During his first term, President Donald Trump signed an order that would have excluded people in the U.S. illegally from being included in the 2020 census numbers used to allot congressional seats. A second order mandated the collection of citizenship data through administrative records. A Republican redistricting expert had written that using citizen voting-age population instead of the total population for the purpose of redrawing congressional and legislative districts could be advantageous to Republicans and non-Hispanic whites.
Trump issued the orders after the U.S. Supreme Court blocked his earlier attempt to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census questionnaire
Both Trump orders were rescinded when President Joe Biden arrived at the White House in January 2021, before the 2020 census figures were released by the U.S. Census Bureau. Trump rescinded Biden’s order last week at the start of his second term, signaling the possibility of a push by his new administration to change the 2030 census.
