The 2020 census is already underway, and it famously does not include a citizenship question — which states could have used to draw districts based on citizen population rather than total population. But now the administration has announced another idea to address the nexus between voting and immigration: “To the maximum extent feasible and consistent with the discretion delegated to the executive branch,” it will try to remove illegal immigrants specifically from the numbers used to determine how many House seats each state is given to begin with.
To what extent is this indeed feasible and consistent with the law? Here is a very brief overview of the administration’s apparent plan, its arguments supporting the proposal, and the very difficult hurdles.
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