For Immediate Release
SEN. HOWIE MORALES CONDEMNS CITIZENSHIP QUESTION IN FEDERAL CENSUS
(Santa Fe, NM) – State Senator Howie Morales (D-Silver City) today strongly condemned the Trump Administration’s decision to include a question regarding the US Citizenship status of respondents of the 2020 Census. Morales, who is a member of the New Mexico Senate Finance Committee, also emphasized that the unusual change to the census could financially hit New Mexico hard by reducing federal funding for a broad array of services.
“The people of New Mexico demand that all of us be counted in the Census, just like the Constitution explicitly states. In the 2010 Census, our state population was composed of 48.5 % of Hispanics, and we know that an accurate count in 2020 will reflect a sizable increase in that number. We will not allow political interference to put into question the accuracy of our state’s population count. This blatant political interference would also lead to gross distortions of our funding streams and re-districting processes. I join legislators from across the country in calling on the Trump Administration to reverse course, and if they ignore the pleas from experts around the country, then Congress has a duty to protect the integrity of our Census,” said Sen. Morales.
“So many federal grants use census population counts in their funding formulas, including Medicaid and public education. I am extremely concerned what may happen to key funding for vulnerable seniors and children in New Mexico if this change is permitted,” added Morales.
Sen. Morales is a member of the National Hispanic Caucus of State Legislators (NHCSL), which represents the voices of more than 400 Hispanic state legislators from across the country, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, which also was highly critical of the inclusion of this question.
“This decision was taken at the eleventh hour and demonstrates the plainly partisan and racist purposes behind the decision to include the citizenship question. The Trump Administration’s own prior statements serve as incriminating evidence. In January, the Office of Management and Budget struck a question to combine the ethnicity and race categories for which there was ample research and support, alleging that more research was needed. The fact that the new citizenship question has not been researched at all, and in fact was excluded from the main Census test currently taking place in Rhode Island, speaks volumes about the arbitrary and capricious intent of this decision. Therefore, if the Administration is unwilling to reverse this decision, Congress has the responsibility to step in and overturn both decisions designed to undermine the entire decennial Census process. The Courts certainly have good reasons to do so,” said NHCSL President and Senator Carmelo Ríos (PR).
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