Who Counts? Trump Poised To Try To Remove Noncitizens From Census

Following a years-long surge in illegal immigration, the Trump administration is poised to challenge a longstanding but legally fraught practice: counting illegal aliens in the U.S. census.

This is one of those bullshit issues that is only decided on who benefits, not whether or not it’s right.

The census, which takes place every ten years, determines how House seats are distributed and how many votes each state gets in the Electoral College during presidential elections.  Since this decides the government, only citizens should be counted. 

It makes no sense to count permanent residents, people on student or work visas, vacationers or illegal immigrants.  Noncitizens can’t vote so noncitizens don’t count. 

Okay, it does make sense for politicians who don’t care about American citizens.

Some immigration researchers project that including noncitizens in the census count disproportionately benefits Democratic states with large illegal alien populations.

It’s hard to know how many illegal immigrants there are in America, or where they are.  The New York Post says ICE immigration raids empty Home Depot parking lots of day laborers. 

When I go to Home Depot, which I do pretty often, what I usually see is a guy loading lumber on to a trailer and a woman waiting for an employee to help her load a gas grill into her SUV.  Or something like that.  I never see groups of casual workers.  People in other states or cities, have a different experience.

Illegal immigrants would go to liberal states and sanctuary cities.  There is no reason to do otherwise.

A recent study counters that, based on 2020 census figures, there would have been a negligible shift to the political map had the U.S. government excluded noncitizens from that count.

According to Pew Rearch, in 2022, there were 11 million illegal immigrants.  The immigration break down looks like this.

In 2023 and 2024, the Southern border was open and Biden’s administration was conferring temporary legal status on a large number of immigrants.  They were being flown in and settled in areas like Springfield, Ohio.  The numbers have increased, but aren’t accurately known, so this will suffice.

It doesn’t matter.  This should not be a matter of partisan advantage, but should be decided based on voter integrity.  The system should operate properly for Americans.

Based on these 2022 numbers, 25 million people who are not American citizens, would count toward allocating government representation.

The House of Representatives is nearly a 50/50 split.  Presidential election outcomes can be changed if electoral votes are allocated improperly.  Regardless of what party benefits or if there is no change in election outcomes, only citizens can vote and only citizens should count.