Briefing transcript
Transcript.
The Census Is in Trouble: What You Need to Know About Proposed Changes. Rapid-response data briefing, Friday, Sept 18, 2026.
Full transcript
Transcribed automatically from the recording and lightly corrected for names and spelling. Timestamps link to that moment in the video.
We'll go ahead and get started. Hello, everyone. I just want to say I'm glad we got the expanded license for Zoom, because we've got over 600 people on the call so far, and it's still rising. So glad you could make it today. I'm Denice Ross, the Director of the Data Policy Institute at the Federation of American Scientists, and I'm also the former Chief Data Scientist of the United States. Welcome to this rapid response data briefing on the sweeping Changes Proposed for the Decennial Census. Given the pace of changes in data across the federal government, we created this briefing series to raise awareness about potential risks to public data, and most importantly, how you can take action when policy windows like this arise. Captioning is available for today's webinar, and we plan to post a transcript as well.
Next slide, there we go. Today's briefing is co-hosted by our standing hosts, the Association of Public Data Users, APDU, dataindex.us, the Federation of American Scientists, Data Policy Institute, and the Population Reference Bureau. We also are joined by co-hosts the American Association for Public Opinion Research, the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations, the Census Quality Reinforcement Task Force, the Census Project, Fair Count, the Leadership Conference Education Fund, and the Population Association of America. Thank you to all of our partners for putting this together in such quick order. The length of this list gives you some indication of just how important an accurate count of the population is to all Americans. including pollsters and planners, academics, advocates, and everyone in between. We typically keep these briefings to just 30 minutes, but the changes proposed for the decennial Census are so extensive.
and unprecedented, that we're asking for an hour of your time today. And I encourage you to stay for the whole hour, because Chris Dick has some juicy insights on the comments that have already been submitted through this Federal Register notice. We will be sharing some specific actions, and after the webinar, we'll follow up by email with the recording, slides, and links shared. If you have any questions, please put those in the Q&A box. We will do our best to answer as many as we can. And I feel like I say this every time, but that's because it really is true. Today, we have an all-star panel. Each of our panelists holds multiple distinguished roles, but since we have a lot of ground to cover over the next hour, I'm going to highlight just one for each one of them. Mary Jo Mitchell is Director of Government Affairs for the Population Association of America. Ryan Coady is the Legislative Associate for the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations. Dr. Jeanine Abrams McLean is President of Fair Count.
Rob Santos is former director of the U.S. Census Bureau. Dr. Amy O'Hara is Director of the Massive Data Institute at Georgetown. Beth Jarosz is Vice President of the American… of the Association of Public Data Users. Meeta Anand is the Senior Director of Census and Data Equity at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. Caroline Medina is Senior Advisor for Data Policy and Strategy at the Movement Advancement Project, and Chris Dick is co-founder of dataindex.us. Together, they will walk us through proposed changes for the Decennial Census. And before… here are the proposed changes, and before we get into the issues, I do want to point out that unlike many data changes we've seen in the past year, where surveys or forms were changed, or even where departmental policy changed, this proposal would change federal regulatory law. This is a break from historical precedent. Residence criteria for prior decennial censuses were established as departmental policy rather than added to the Code of Federal Regulations. So this is a big deal.
And those changes are not minor. The Census Bureau is proposing changes that would result in an incomplete count and limit the Bureau's ability to ask some demographic questions. We are really at risk of losing our nation's denominators. 2030 might seem far away, but the foundation for an accurate census is being set as we speak, which means that we need to get the details correct now. And we can't simply hope that any problems will be corrected later. So, with those important process notes out of the way, let's turn to our panelists to unpack this proposal. Mary Jo, you're up first. I know you've been an advocate for an accurate census for many years. Can you remind us of some of the reasons why a complete and accurate count is so important?
I would be happy to do so, Denice, and thanks for having me. Many of you may be familiar with the statement on this slide, but it bears repeating. The decennial Census is the largest civilian peacetime operation that the federal government conducts. An undertaking of this magnitude is so consequential that it must be done methodically and with carefully designed preparations over a long period of time. As this graph of the original 2030 Census planning timeline illustrates, preparations for the next decennial actually began prior to the conduct of the 2020 Census, and the ramp up to past Censuses adhered to a similar lengthy deliberative process. Next slide. The time, effort, and resources that are invested in the decennial Census is reflective of its significance. Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution mandates an enumeration of our nation's population every 10 years, and the nation has dutifully fulfilled our nation's forefathers' wishes by conducting a Census every decade since 1790.
One of the original purposes of the decennial Census was to apportion seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. But over time, legal and practical uses of decennial census data have increased. Most notably, the data have become essential for informing the allocation of federal funding. For example, according to a 2023 Census Bureau study, census data were used in fiscal year 2021 to guide the allocation of $2.8 trillion in federal funding. The report identified at least 353 federal assistance programs that year that used census data to inform how they spent their funding.
Whether they know it or not, the American public depends on decennial Census data to help deliver essential services that they depend on every day, including healthcare, emergency preparedness and response, education, roads, and other basic infrastructure. So with that, I'll toss it back to you, Denice.
Thank you. Alright, and next up, we want to talk about what are the residence criteria, and I want to make sure that the slides are advancing, Correctly. So, okay, there we go. So, thank you, thank you, Mary Jo. So, Ryan, one of the critical but sometimes underappreciated uses of census data is for regional planning. I was so glad you could join us today. Can you tell us, from the planning perspective, why a complete and accurate census is so important?
Sure, and first, I just want to say thank you for having me here today, and for pulling this group together for this conversation. To answer your question, it's important to preface that we've not been able to fully collect feedback from our members on this issue yet. But early on, there are some specific concerns that we have regarding this proposed rule, and its impact on regional planning, and specifically transportation planning from an MPO perspective. For MPOs, they're core planning documents, forecasting models, and other tools that help plan infrastructure investments are reliant on Census data. This is true for general regional planning and all planning, funding, and service delivery purposes. Getting a little more into the specifics, population counts are critical in deciding funding amounts and the funding distribution of federal discretionary and formula programs.
Further, Census demographic data informs planning efforts for measuring need, identifying and addressing demographic and socioeconomic criteria, and other factors used for federal funding decisions. It's also a part of federal statute for MPO work to be comprehensive. This means supporting infrastructure investments, housing and community development, economic development, public health, and emergency management. Focusing more on the regional impact of this order, some of our specific concerns around census data is around the use of census data to inform federal planning and funding processes, specifically around MPO designation. This includes things like identifying TMAs, which are transportation management areas, so Populations over 200,000, funding distributions, how much funding can be sub-allocated to specific regions.
transit and formula funding, competitive grant applications, and long-range regional planning. These are all things that are very sensitive to adjustments in count data and can disrupt designation processes, which consequently have funding, impacts as well. From early feedback from our members, these specific concerns are rooted in the proposed rule's potential to create this disconnect between census-reported data and actual population counts. As previously noted, this data is what informs how MPOs plan and the inputs they use for their modeling, forecasting regional transportation or economic trends, and other different practices being completed at MPOs. Less precision or inaccurate inputs can therefore impact how communities plan for the services, transportation, infrastructure, emergency services, and other community resources.
Lastly, this in conjunction with the previous administrative order out of the Department of Commerce on disclosure avoidance methodology, creates general concerns over data precision, especially in those smaller geographic areas. Together, all this makes some concerns centered around MPO designation. Funding levels, and general planning and forecasting work. Speaking just simply on behalf of AMPO, to better understand this issue and to get the full input from our membership, we are going to be looking into a request, for an extension of this comment period, so we can better understand the impacts of this order.
Thank you, Ryan, and I appreciate you commenting on the period for the comment. It is shorter than usual, so I'm glad you all will be requesting an extension. Next we're going to dive into the first part of the proposed change. Jeanine, I know you care deeply about making sure that everyone is not just counted, but counted in the right place. Can you walk us through what residence criteria are, and why they are important?
Definitely, Denice. And so, the first thing I want to talk about is that, is to remind people that the decennial Census must count each person once and at their usual residence. And so residency, residence criteria clarify what usual residence means. Many of us, but not all of us, are straightforward. We live in one home year-round. But others spend their time, or split their time between different cities, or have more transient lifestyles. For instance, I have a friend who splits her time equally between New Orleans and Chicago every year. And increasingly, we are seeing more complexity in the U.S. with regard to residency.
So for people with more than one home, residence criteria define which home they should be counted at. And without clear criteria, military personnel, college students, foster youth, transient workers, and others could be missed or not counted in the right place. But it's also important to acknowledge that the rules are sometimes controversial. For example, for college students, parents or guardians think that their child should count at the parental home, but the college is where the student lives most of the time, so that is where they are counted. And in 2020, the rule counting incarcerated people at the facility where they're confined, rather than in their home community, generated strong public reactions. And organizations like the Prison Policy Initiative have written extensively about the concerns and consequences of that policy.
Because these questions are hard, and because how Americans live keeps changing, the Bureau periodically reviews and updates the residents' criteria to reflect changes in housing, mobility, and living arrangements. And to align with constitutional and statutory obligations. For instance, in 2020, as the number of people owning second homes continued to expand, the residents' criteria provided updated guidance regarding seasonal homes, RVs, and, also situations like transitional or transitory workers. And lastly, it's important to note that public input has always been, or has been essential to the development of updated residence criteria. And we know that transparent and clear guidance is critical for respondents and enumerators to accurately operationalize the residence criteria.
So thanks, and I'll turn it back over to you, Denice.
Thank you, Jeanine. Next up is Rob Santos. Rob, I know you've… I've heard you say that the goal of the decennial is to count everyone once, only once, and in the right place. We're going to talk about all of these pieces, but I'd love for you to get us started with the counting once part. How do the proposed changes affect the requirement to count everyone?
Certainly. These, thank you. First of all, thank you for the invitation to provide some commentary on the proposed residency role changes. I'm actually, I believe that they're going to have a great impact on counting once, only once, and in the right place. And, I'm going to talk about two aspects. First, the residency rule itself. And then secondly, the potential addition of a citizenship or legal status question. Now, if you go to the FRN and you take a look at the residency changes, they ultimately, when all is said and done, call for enumerating only U.S. citizens
and legal permanent residents, folks with green cards. Everyone else… is literally defined as not a part of the U.S. population. Now, this change is being proposed, despite the 14th Amendment that requires that we Count all whole persons in each state.
And by the way, the Constitution wasn't meant to be understood only by lawyers and scholars, right? The target population was we, the people. So when you see language by, like, count all whole persons in each state, it's pretty clear. And Having said that, ultimately, I think that this will be litigated in courts, and the Supreme Court will have its say. Now, under these current rules, the types of folks excluded will be folks like undocumented immigrants, DACA students.
International students who have visas to stay here while they study. Legal asylum seekers that sometimes wait years before their hearings occur. You know, there are an estimated 14 to 15 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. That's about 4% of the population. 1 in 25. Now, certainly, there needs to be some adjustments for the usual residency rules from one decade to the next to align to the usual residence.
Within an evolving society like ours. So, for example, the military personnel stationed overseas, we ended up counting those a few censuses ago, and that was considered a major change. But… It only added a couple hundred thousand people. On the other hand, This new residency role?
Would intentionally exclude well over 15 million people from enumeration. Folks who previously had been part Of our decennial Censuses. So the proposed residency rule change, it's not a minor or even a modest update. Frankly, it's a seismic shift.
Period. We literally won't know the total U.S. population under these rules. The U.S. population, as everyone conventionally defines it, of course. And if enacted, again, you can bet on, rigorous, litigation. Now.
The other issue I wanted to talk about was this notion of considering either a citizenship question, a legal status question, like, do you have a green card? Or… or a combination. And interestingly, The Census Bureau has extensively researched the inclusion of a citizenship question. They concluded with that research that it would significantly reduce self-response, especially among the hardest to enumerate. And there's a link, that will be provided to you for a 2025 article by, Brown and Haganus.
Now, Another issue is the trust issue associated with these rules. Given current immigration policy, any legal status question on a decennial census would amplify mistrust in the public, especially among the foreign-born populations. Mistrust, as I believe we all know, is highly related to non-participation in censuses and surveys. Again, this is documented in Bureau of Census Research.
Look, we need to be building trust in advance of the 2030 Census, not Damaging it. So not only would legal status questions disenfranchise the public, Enumeration error would rise significantly. These new rules would add more complexity and burden to the public Leading to more confusion and error.
No cognitive research has been done, to my knowledge, on this. Would people even understand these new rules? Moreover, added complexity and increasing mistrust would also lead to higher costs of conducting censuses. You have to do more in-person follow-ups, more error checking, etc. The proposed residency rules, they really,
they have problems, and that's what I wanted… that's my conclusion as a former director, the most recent former director of the Census Bureau. We need to help our decision makers in Washington understand this. So that there is an informed, final decision that can be achieved, one that best serves the American public. That's what I have to say. Thank you.
Rob, thank you so much. Now Amy, Amy O'Hara. The proposal also includes surprising requirements to use tax records and the administrative data provided by federal agencies. That's a quote. And it explicitly mentions tax returns and W-2s. As an expert in using administrative data for the Census, can you tell us about what that proposal might be promising and what the risks are?
Sure. Thanks, Denice. I'm Amy O'Hara, and I like administrative data. However. We should not use them rashly or naively. There's a crucial concept called fitness for use, so that we can use the data responsibly. And I've worked for years to determine when and how administrative data can be used for population measurement. And I will say that over time, the available systems, the data systems themselves, and the methods have changed, which is great on net. But a hasty move to an administrative data census without thorough research and testing would be inappropriate. Why? Because, as this slide indicates, records do not cover the entire U.S. population. We can't just go to one file or two files and put them together and say, that's the U.S. POP.
We need to understand the coverage and consistency of any data that are used in statistical production. They also need to have the right information. we need to understand whether the concepts in the data are appropriately aligned. And there's a really important, example here, which is usual residence. Administrative data are not always aligned with the concept of usual residence. Tax records, as indicated numerous times in this regs change, would require
having that residential address, but most of the time, they have the mailing address. They may not even have an individual's mailing address, it might be their tax preparer or their representative. Also, the information in that address may be out of date, so just using the administrative data, it needs a lot of careful analysis. In the reg exchange, it says that all of the section about which military records are going to be used, and it says that they would lean to tax data. And that's a concern, because most of the time, that is not going to line up with usual residents. It's really important to know which sources are going to be used, which they propose to use, which they have tested. And we also need to understand the provenance of that data.
When and how it was collected, and for what purpose. In the past, I've acquired files that supposedly represent the U.S. population on April 1. Sometimes the file had 100 million people, sometimes it had 800 million people. So we needed to have substantial analysis and debuplication, and also understanding how you can operationalize that information. Further, to really deploy administrative data in the Census, you need to do a lot of data linkage. person-level, address-level linkage. It's got to be to the right housing unit, and you often have to link across files to get the information that's needed. And it takes a lot of work to resolve duplicates and discrepancies across files.
And we really deserve transparency on that process and the outcomes that different methodologies would result in. Put simply, we need to understand how the Census would handle two records that would represent residents in different addresses. What are the business rules that you could apply, and how would we be assured that one of the records would count, and they wouldn't discard both because of that seeming discrepancy? We also need to understand and have evidence about how linkage can introduce errors. There could be both false positives, where you link to the wrong person, and false negative, where matches that should have happened were missed.
So fundamentally, looking at all of this, the Code of Federal Regulations is not the right place to mandate which administrative records should be used for a census, and we all deserve to understand how they will be used. That's my take on the administrative data part.
Thank you, Amy, for covering so much ground so quickly. Turning to Beth to continue on this thread, Beth, you've been digging into how this proposal differs from how the Census was conducted in the past. Can you walk us through some of those changes?
Sure. So, for those of you who don't track this very clearly, or very closely, I want to say that Title 13 of U.S. Code requires that the population be counted as of a census date. In recent years, that date has been April 1st. Operations often begin before Census Day, with mailers, self-response, and some field operations beginning before April, but the intent has always been to count the population on Census day. However, the proposed rule introduces the unprecedented concept of a reference period from January 3rd to April 1st that is inconsistent with the Census Day requirement. Next slide, please. How do we know it's inconsistent? The language itself says that people will be counted where they spend, and I quote, the greatest number of days during that enumeration period. Even more bizarrely, the rule's written so that spending just a single hour in a, quote, residence counts toward your tally of the number of days. Next slide, please.
So this sets up some really wild possibilities. If a foster child spends January and February at one residence, but then moves to a new placement sometime in March, should their new guardian assume that the earlier guardian tallied the days and will count that child? Or will that child simply be missed in the census? What about seasonal workers? What about people who were hospitalized for much of the enumeration period but are home on April 1st? Clearly, the reference period causes complications. Amy explained why tax records may not align with the concept of usual residence nor the reference period. Also, what even is a residence? Is a boat a residence? Sometimes it is. In the most recent data from 2024, there were more than 200,000 boats, RVs, or vans that were listed as a residence in the American Community Survey. What about a home-based daycare?
Obviously, the residents of the person who lives there, but what about those daycare workers? When they go to work, are they spending at least 1 hour a day in a residence? Maybe. So these are just a few of the numerous edge cases to illustrate just how problematic this framing is of an accurate count of everyone once, only once, and in the right place. Next slide, please. And I want to note that in prior decennial Census counts, the Bureau, based on extensive testing and robust public input, provided extremely detailed guidance for residential situations like those I just described. And nearly all of that has been eliminated in the new rule. That includes specifics on where to count children in boarding schools, in foster care, people staying at domestic violence shelters, and many more.
Meanwhile, merchant Marines who are abroad on Census Day and are not returning to a U.S. port are written in as being counted. And there are also numerous changes for military service members. We don't have time to get into all of those details today, but I'll share more information with a link about those changes. So the short… the takeaway here is, if implemented as written, these rules set up the nation for, at best, an incredibly difficult challenge in counting everyone once, only once, and in the right place. And I'll share a link for where you can read more.
Thank you, Beth. Next up is Meeta. Meeta, I know you're concerned about several dimensions of the proposal, but I'd like you to focus on the prohibition against gathering data on race and ethnicity. Can you tell us what's in the proposal and why that raises concerns?
Absolutely, and it is an absolute honor to be here amongst such luminaries, such as yourself, and Director Santos and the rest. Hi, everyone. So. What has been covered so far is in the residence rule criteria portion of the proposed rule. A different part of the rule proposes that we no longer collect race or ethnicity data on the decennial Census. I would like everyone to just sit with that for a moment, because removing race and ethnicity questions would make this the first census in 236 years without those data. There is no precedent for a decennial census that does not ask about race and ethnicity.
And while I know we all wish to live in a colorblind society, we live in a society where racial and ethnic differences often lead to different outcomes and needs due to the structures of our society. Ultimately, good decisions require good information, and in order to understand America, we need to understand the people who live here, and that requires having race and ethnicity data. Next slide, please. Census race and ethnicity data are essential to accurate research and informed planning in every sector. We already saw earlier how decennial Census data serve as the denominator, while decennial census race and ethnicity data also serve as an essential denominator.
These data are a statistical benchmark, an irreplaceable statistical benchmark against which virtually every representative study conducted in the U.S. is designed, weighted, and validated. This cannot be replaced by any other sources, including the American Community Survey or third-party data, because the comprehensiveness of the decennial Census data is unmatched, and the geographic specificity is also unmatched. We all know that Census race and ethnicity data are deeply essential in upholding civil rights laws, such as the Voting Rights Act, and ensuring equal access at the voting… at the ballot box. But this is also about people's lives. Public… Census race and ethnicity data are critical for public health and safety needs.
The ability to help us stay healthy, have doctors and health officials measure and track rates of important health indicators, such as maternal and infant mortality, cancer incidents, vaccine coverage, and environmental risk. To not track these data is to put people's lives unnecessarily at risk. Businesses also need these data to succeed and expand, to create new jobs and economic opportunity. They rely on these data to make investment decisions and to understand who their audiences are. And, as we all know, a representative democracy depends on an accurate picture of the people it serves. And that accurate picture includes race and ethnicity data. And in order to have policymaking that serves and reflects the experience of all Americans, these are essential data.
Ultimately, we need these data to understand America, to make better decisions, to measure change, and to ensure accountability. Next slide, please. So, we have a few webinars coming up to discuss this even further, and we'll be diving more into the race and ethnicity components, as well as some of the other things we've heard today, and you're seeing it in the chat. Thank you so much, Beth. The Leadership Conference, we're having our webinar on September 22nd at 2 p.m, where we will really explore on a Sector-by-sector basis. why these data are so essential for our policy making and our ability to measure and achieve change. Over to you, Denice.
Thanks, Meeta. It won't surprise you that the Q&A is on fire with your comments. If you want to jump in there, Meeta, and start answering if you get a chance. Thank you so much, though. And, next up is Caroline. So, Caroline, the other proposed prohibition is against asking about sexual orientation. Can you tell us what's in the proposal and why it's concerning?
Yeah, thanks, Denice. So, the proposed rule would prohibit questions about sexual orientation on the Decennial Census, even though the Census does not currently include an explicit, stand-alone sexual orientation question. In other words, the rule would foreclose the Bureau's ability to adopt this measure in the future, regardless of what research or data needs may emerge. And that's not entirely hypothetical. The Census Bureau has previously considered adding sexual orientation and gender identity on the American Community Survey and the Decennial Census in response to formal requests from multiple federal agencies that identified a need for these data, including for purposes of enforcing civil rights laws. However, those efforts were ultimately halted.
With respect to the current proposal, rather than preemptively prohibiting sexual orientation data collection, decisions about adding new demographic questions to future censuses should really be guided by a deliberative process. And that should include rigorous research and testing, consultation with federal agencies about their legal and programmatic needs for the data, including needs at small geographic levels. And a meaningful engagement with subject matter experts and impacted communities. That process should also include transparency about what content changes are being considered, who requested them, what legal or statistical purposes they are intended to serve, what testing has been conducted, and what Census subject matter experts recommend.
In this case, the Bureau has not provided that kind of evidence or reasoning. The proposed rule would instead preclude the addition of a sexual orientation question on future censuses without sufficient evidence, legal citations, or explanation for why that prohibition is warranted. Next slide, please. Now, the proposed rules prohibition on sexual orientation also raises important questions about whether and how decennial census data on same-sex couples will continue to be collected and reported. Same-sex couples have been counted through the Decennial Census household relationship question for decades. Most recently, the Census Bureau redesigned that question for the 2020 Decennial Census specifically to improve the accuracy of same-sex couple counts. The redesign added separate response categories for same-sex and opposite-sex couples, including both spouses and unmarried partners.
And it introduced consistency checks between the relationship and sex questions. And importantly, these were not arbitrary changes. They were based on more than a decade of Census Bureau research by statisticians like Nancy Bates and others identifying substantial measurement errors and data quality problems with previous approaches. And the Bureau made these methodological improvements in order to produce more accurate data. Based on these data, we know that in 2020, there were 1.16 million same-sex couples in the United States, with couples located in every state, and nearly 1 in 5 raising children. These data have been used for rigorous research, program design, and efforts to advance LGBTQ civil rights. And they remain critical for understanding the size and characteristics of same-sex couple households, including same-sex married couples, particularly in light of the Obergefell Supreme Court decision and federal and interstate recognition under the Respect for Marriage Act.
It's critical that the Census Bureau does not restrict the collection or publication of same-sex couple data through the household relationship question. Doing so would undermine data quality and reverse methodological improvements that the Bureau made specifically to address known measurement problems. And with that, I'll turn it back over to you, Denice, and I'll drop a link in the chat as well.
Thank you, Caroline. Next up is Chris Dick. Chris, are there any points that you want to talk about? I see you, I see that you've been noting what else we need to talk about, given some of the questions in the Q&A. So what haven't we already covered? And especially given that these proposals are not yet new regulations, there's an opportunity for the public to weigh in. Tell us more about what we can do.
Absolutely. Thank you, Denice. So even though we've already spent almost 40 minutes, 39 minutes by my count, talking already, there's still so much more to unpack. First of all, one of the questions that came in in the Q&A, it's not even on the slide, we're doing this live here, is the impact on other data sets. If we don't have a complete count in the decennial Census, that flows through to the population estimates, which are those official counts of the United States in years that don't end in zero. And from there, those population estimates in the decennial Census are used to weight all the other surveys we care about, whether it's the American Community Survey or any other survey that the government does on people.
those data are used to weight those surveys. So, the impact of this is not just the decennial Census, it goes beyond that into all of our other data sets. However, there are other things that we haven't even, that are different in this, in these proposed changes that we haven't even, talked through yet. First of all, the language of the change actually weakens mandatory response to only include a few of the questions on the Census, not all of them. The second one is that the status question is really untested. We don't have the thorough and rigorous testing that the Census Bureau usually does to show that the question will actually work when it's in the field. Third, there's inconsistent language within the document, and this is, especially the case for some of the military pieces, where for different military statuses, they're actually asking for different documents, and there's a lot of internal inconsistency in what they're suggesting.
Finally, there are only 33 days for comment, despite this being a significant regulatory action. Additionally, the impact on AIAN populations is a little bit unknown. I've read from a few folks who are reading this very closely, that they've kind of heard or read that AIN is not going to be treated as a race or ethnicity. And we're trying to figure out exactly what that means, and what that means for the count of that population. Really, the key thing here is that we are going to be trying to put together as much information as we can on all of this, but you also need to go read it all. And especially, one of the things that we brought up is this, the PRIA, the Proposed,
sorry, I got the acronym correct before, but it's the preliminary Regulatory Impact Analysis, because you'll see some very interesting things there, including statements from the Census Bureau about potential impacts on the American Community Survey. Next slide, please. Okay, so Denice teased this at the start. There have been comments coming in, and I want to give a huge shout out to Abigail Haddad and Chris Marcum for developing tools that allow us to pull data from regulations.gov and analyze the data very, very quickly. So, from the comments so far, we've had over 900 comments, and of those, just over 77% have been in support of these changes.
I just want you all to hear that so that you know, kind of what comments we are hearing so far. About 33% of the total comments so far seem to be a form letter campaign. 44% seem to be independently written, even if they are, maybe supported by some of those form letter campaigns, and 21% oppose the changes. Next slide, please. So, for the folks who are supporting the change, what are they saying? Across those 429 independently written supporting comments, we see that about 53% of them are saying that non-citizens should not affect representation. 26% talk about general immigration enforcement, and again, about immigrants not being included.
20% of folks are saying that race questions are divisive or irrelevant. 16% are saying that these changes are in line with the Constitution or the Founders' intent. And, 11% are saying… are talking about federal funding and benefits and the positive impacts that this will have on those things. 8% are saying that it's going to improve Census data quality. 7% say that this is, will turn on fairness to lawful immigrants, and 4% are focused on less government data collection. We say all of this for a very important reason, and that's because we want all of you who care about this to have your voice heard, too. So if we go to the next slide…
we can look at how you can submit a comment. So if you go to this website, regulations.gov, and search for this, this set of letters and, numbers, USBC-2026-0628, And you will come to this page. And what you will see here is all of the documents. So you have the preliminary regulatory impact analysis that I told you to all do your homework and read. Please go read that. You have the actual proposed rule, and then down on the bottom right-hand side, you have the ability to comment. That is where you want to go and write those comments. So that… that is a huge piece. And now, how can we help in this? Next slide, please. A large group of us have put together a website, literally launched at 1pm. It's called Hands Off Our Census. The way you spell it is hands off our C-E-N-S dot U-S, and this is a place where we are going to be,
aggregating a lot of information for folks who want to know more, and who want to respond and comment on this proposed change. So we're going to be adding a ton to this over the coming weeks and coming days. If you have information to add to it. please, please email us at questions@handsoffourcens.us. And what we're currently planning on including is information… background information about the proposal, a comment guide, how to submit comments, a comment tracker and analysis, so kind of like the two slides I showed before. Links to briefings and webinars, just like this one, and any other one that occurs, news article aggregation, and toolkits to help you get the word out.
If we go to the next slide. So how can you take action? Again, just as a reminder here, definitely go to this link and submit a comment. You can… submit a comment requesting to extend the comment period. A 90-day comment period, which is what you would usually have for a substantial change, would go through December 10th. You can submit your thoughts on any or every part of the proposed rule. You don't have to submit your comments on everything, but you… you can submit your comments on everything. And to stay informed, we're gonna have way more links than this, but these are a few places you can, stay informed. The first is the hands-offer Census.
dataindex.us, apdu.org, federaldataforum.prb.org is another great place to do so. And if you have any questions, you can send them, for now at info@dataindex.us, but we will also have that questions@handsoffourcens.us in the follow-up email. So… Before we kind of wrap up, I would actually like to invite, former Director Rob Santos back. He's been on the receiving end of some of these comments before, and I'd really love to hear his thoughts and some of the valuable insights he can offer us.
Well, thank you very much, Chris. Indeed, I've been on the receiving end of many a comment when I basically toured the United States. And, spoke to people who had concerns about some of the things Census were doing, but also other people who were very supportive of some of the great work, scientific work that the Census Bureau was conducting as well. My comments here are, you know, as you've seen, folks. The implications, at least according to the experts here today that are presenting, the implications of implementing the proposed residency and demographic rules, they're sobering.
You have a right to support them or not. Now, many of the folks who are participants, not in, you know, attending, many of the attendees, You have your own unique insights. And everyone.
People, businesses, local governments, everyone will be affected if these Proposed rules go through. And we… Us, everyone around this table here, including on the webinar, are in a position to communicate what we believe the consequences of implementing those rules will be. We support the Census Bureau, especially the career staff, and we support our nation and our people.
We all have a civic obligation to our country. Completing the Census, completing the ACS if we're selected, voting. And I'd like to think that we have a civic obligation to inform our elected officials and government decision makers when we happen to have information and opinions on issues that they are dealing with. This is one of those times.
Let's do our due diligence. By helping decision makers in Census and really in commerce, make informed decisions by commenting on the Federal Register Notice before the October date. I think it's 13th. So I encourage you all to do so, as well as to contact your elected officials.
With your commentary. After all, The legislative branch has the obligation to direct the Census Bureau on how it conducts decennial censuses. They just happened to delegate that to Commerce, to the Secretary of Commerce. Finally, let's please keep supporting and applauding the wonderful Census Bureau career staff, the experts, the analysts, the programmers who continue to produce quality statistics on our nation and our economy.
So, those were my comments, and thank you very much.
Thank you, Rob, and I just… want to soak up all the love that's coming through the channels for our colleagues inside the Census, the career staff. So, huge thanks to the career staff for the… the work that you do. And,
We have some time for questions, about 10 minutes for questions. I want to start with, one that's at the top and the bottom of our Q&A, and they're similar. One is, can the rules change if a new administration comes in 2028? And then the other is, could we, could we un… like, if this goes through, could it be undone? How could it be repealed? Any of our process people, Meeta, Mary Jo, Beth, Chris, want to respond to, to those? Can we, can we undo this?
Okay, I'll bite. So, yes, on the one hand, there is, of course, the possibility of having a new residence rule passed with a new administration. There's several hurdles to this, which is probably why Rob just appeared, but, like, one… one reason is… On April 1st of 2027, the topics of questions that are going to be asked of the Census have to be presented to Congress. And in… on March 31st of 2028, the actual questions have to be presented to Congress. So there's… there's a… things getting baked in. And the third part, I love how I'm, like, channeling Rob, because it's completely impossible, so… but the third part is.
There are operational and research decisions that are being made at this moment that would be in service of this residence rule, should it go forward. The further along we go on the path, the harder it is to change. Do I say that there's no way of going back? No. It's just that that hill will be a very hard hill to climb. With certain obstacles, both procedural and operational.
Rob?
Ken, yeah, I, thank you. I'd like to just add, a perspective. So, in, in March of 2020, Society came to a stop because of COVID. literally to a stop. You know, people move to… into the… into rural areas, you know.
Because everyone was scared. We didn't know the nature of the beast. In the midst of that, the Census Bureau, on a dime, reinvented its operation To basically respond to what otherwise everyone else would have thought was an impossible task. So, I know that the career staff themselves are so dedicated that they will do whatever they need to do To conduct the highest quality possible.
enumeration of the… of the people of the United States. That doesn't mean that things could just flip around. There are things like forms. If forms have citizenship questions printed on them, 2029 is probably too late to, you know. to print up a whole set of new forms. But it would be more of a matter of mitigation as opposed to, you know, going back to the way it was. That would be a high bar. Thank you.
Mary Jo, do you want to add?
Yeah, I just wanted to circle back to where we're at in this moment, and I think all of us could learn from the recent experience of the proposed OMB rule governing the uniform guidance for federal financial assistance, and And how, vocal, constituents and stakeholders were about the implications of that rule, and what we ended up with was language in the continuing resolution that has postponed implementation of the rule, at least through the duration of the current CR, through mid-December. And so I think it just shows that when we make a lot of noise and we lift up our voices, you know, we can get the attention of Congress, and even to act in the, immediate, future to respond to our concerns. So I think While we're still working through the strategy, I just want to reiterate that not a hope is lost, and we should look to use every tool in our toolbox to at least buy more time. So keep those comments coming, both to extend the comment period, as well as to address all of the issues that this proposed rule has raised for us.
Thank you, Mary Jo. We, we have a couple of questions about the, about whether, and I'm sorry, I'm looking at the interface here, about, about whether it's better to send many, have many comments that are more of a form letter or individual ones. If someone could speak to that, and then there's a lot of interest, Chris, in the date… the source of the data. that you showed that was hot off the press. So if you could just sort of explain where people might be able to find that. So maybe, Chris, I'll turn it to you, so you can talk about the comments that have already come in, and the insights on sort of the form letter approach versus the individual, and then we'll open it up to the rest of the panelists.
Yeah, absolutely. So, the… the data that… we talked about today, are actually just pulled directly from regulations.gov. So regulations.gov is where we're telling you to go and actually make those comments. It's also where both the PRRIA, as well as the rule, the proposed rule, are posted. They also allow folks to download comments as they, as they are posting them. So that's where we've downloaded those comments, and then we've used some tools to summarize them. And we can also provide links to that tool, because again, the work that Abigail Haddad and Chris Marcum have done to put that tool together are absolutely fantastic. The second piece of that is the form versus individual submissions.
And others feel free to jump in here, but at the end of the day, a comment is very useful, and having a lot of numbers, having high numbers. either in support of or opposition of is a useful thing. With that being… with that being said, I do know that sometimes, they go through and deduplicate some of those, form responses, so they have an idea of how many are kind of independent comments versus non-independent comments. So there's always a top-line number, and then there's… there's that piece. I don't know if others want to say anything about that, but that's That's kind of my… my push on… on things.
Chris, I'm gonna… I'm gonna plus-one you here, which is, there… there is, a component of, if it's a form comment letter, how will it be counted as the administration for the purposes of comments submitted? That is not unique to this administration. That is just trying to capture the reasons why people are giving, that people are giving, for why they're opposed or in favor of a comment. That is also very different than showing the level of public interest, whether it be ire or joy. Hopefully, in this instance, ire. So, what I would say is we want to see numbers, very high numbers, and we want them to be overwhelmingly opposed to these resonance rules.
To the extent they can be unique, that is fantastic. A narrative of lots of comments is very important either way. Whether it's for media purposes or litigation purposes, you want to be able to point to that large number, whether or not that is a comment generated out of a portal where it's just a different name at the bottom, or whether you've spent two weeks coming up with a carefully crafted comment that is 50 pages long. We love that one, too, because that'll probably have lots of great information, but we just really want to see those high-volume comments.
I want to plus one to what Meeta said, and really, because there was a question specifically in the chat about, like, why bother? You know, if we think that they're not going to get red, if we think they're not going to make a difference, why… why should we even submit? And Meeta hinted on it, but I want to put a really fine point on it, that, also for people who are asking what could be done if this goes forward, litigation is going to happen. Litigation is part of any census process, and so having a record of what the public overwhelming perspective was is really important. So it's important to submit, even if you don't think that it's going to change things at this moment.
Thank you, and I wanted to close with a question, just because it's an important one. The window for comments is only 33 days, which is really short, especially if, you know, we're the core people who are paying attention, and then you need to get the word out to your constituents and the constituents of your constituents, and whatnot. So, would love for anybody to comment on what we might say, what people might say in their letters. To… in response to the Federal Register notice about the… about the comment period, the length of the comment period.
Meeta, I know you have a lot on this, but I think asking for that comment period to be 90 days, as a normal, substantial change would require, I think is a big… a big push that can and should be made. But if others have anything to add, I think that's…
Yeah, I'm not going to get into the technicalities here, but this, you know, by any reasonable read, would be a significant rulemaking, which is definitely deserving. of more than 30 days. 30 days is the minimum. However, for something this significant, we would expect to see, 90 days, at least 60, but here, let's say 90. Think about this. We've all been talking about this for an hour, and all of us are saying, I didn't get to that other point, and there's one more thing I need to say, and the questions are innumerable. There is a lot to examine here. I want to make one other point.
Last year, the Commerce Department disbanded all the Census Bureau Advisory Committees. So that opportunity for public input, which we would have had through those advisory committees, does not exist. This is the opportunity for public input. So if people are willing to even submit a short comment now that just says. Please extend the response period so that we have the ability to properly grapple with these changes. That is something you could do immediately, and then you could, you know, put your head down and fingertips to keyboard and get the other comment letter ready, so that we're ready to have as many comments as possible, like I said before, by October 13th, which is the end of the comment period.
Thank you, Meeta, and we'll take your word as the last one. Want to take a moment to thank all of our panelists, sharing their time and expertise with us today, and for all of you, all 900 of you who showed up, I think, for caring about public data. And just a reminder, in case you missed any of the links, we will be sharing the slides, the list of actions, and the webinar recording, so go, submit those comments and extension requests. Thank you all.