Tipsheet

Trump Floats This Modest Proposal In Wake Of 'Ridiculous' SCOTUS Decision On The 2020 Census

Oh, so once again, Chief Justice John Roberts decided to knife us in the back with this citizenship question. Katie wrote about this earlier today, where the conservative wing rightfully took the liberal justices to the woodshed over their trash opinion about the citizenship question in the upcoming census. It’s not a definitive decision. It just gets tossed back down to the lower courts, but by the time this gets totally settled, it’ll be too late. This question has been asked before and the Court didn’t find it to be an unconstitutional initiative:

…The Court did not find the question to be a violation of the law, but instead didn't receive enough information from the Commerce Department and Secretary Wilbur Ross to make a decision. This leaves the door open for the citizenship question to be included on the census in the future.

"The Secretary’s decision to reinstate a citizenship question is amenable to  review  for compliance  with  those and  other  provisions of  the  Census Act,  according  to the  general   requirements   of  reasoned   agency   decision making, "Roberts wrote in his opinion. "At  the  heart of  this  suit is  respondents’  claim that  the  Secretary abused  his  discretion in  deciding  to reinstate  a  citizenship question."

"Altogether, the evidence  tells  a story  that  does not  match the explanation the Secretary gave for his decision," he continued. "Altogether, the evidence  tells a  story  that does  not  match the explanation the Secretary gave for his decision.  In the Secretary’s telling, Commerce was simply acting on a routine data  request from  another  agency."

The Trump administration should just add this question to the survey regardless. If you cannot vote here, you shouldn’t be counted. Period. It’s not really a controversial position. The president responded earlier today, calling the decision “ridiculous,” and floated the idea to delay the census until a proper decision can be rendered.  

“I have asked the lawyers if they can delay the Census, no matter how long, until the United States Supreme Court is given additional information from which it can make a final and decisive decision on this very critical matter,” said President Trump.

This was a disappointing decision by the Court. Roberts has now sided with liberals on two of the most consequential decisions, Obamacare and the Census, and I can see why scores of conservatives are starting to have buyer’s remorse here. Roberts is starting to ‘Souterize.’  

We discussed this on today's episode of Triggered: