The Census Bureau is proposing rules with major changes to how the U.S. population will be counted in the 2030 Census, raising alarms among state demographers and nonprofit leaders in North Carolina.
The proposed rules from the Trump administration includes how and whether race and sexuality are tracked, and also the unprecedented exclusion of non-U.S. citizens without a green card.
The administration's proposal was released online in early September and public comments can be submitted through Oct. 13.
State demographers and nonprofit officials expressed their concerns during a virtual panel this week titled "Protect Our Count" organized by the NC Counts Coalition, a statewide nonprofit.
"If you take these permanent changes together, and apply them to the way we take our family picture of America, you could see that you would wind up with a picture in 2030 that is much less accurate," said John Quinterno, the Governor's Census Liaison and State Data Center coordinator with the Office of State Budget and Management.
"People in the wrong place, people erased ... and the important rich details being erased out," Quinterno said.
The rule changes include the banning of questions about race and ethnicity, as well as questions about sexual orientation.
North Carolina nonprofit leaders say these changes could bring a slew of of consequences with ripple effects, such as reducing crucial federal funding for nonprofits and inaccurately counting populations to designate congressional representation.
"The Census is our currency," said Jovita Lee Miller, deputy director for North Carolina Black Alliance. "If communities are undercounted, then you can also be sure that those communities are underresourced. Our federal government allocates over a trillion dollars across various programs using data from the Census."
For the first time, U.S. Census Bureau's proposed changes would exclude most noncitizens for congressional apportionment except for citizens and legal permanent residents.
If enacted, these new rules could change North Carolina's share of representatives in Congress and votes in the Electoral College, as well as redraw state maps of voting districts.
Those opposed also say these changes threaten the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment, which says the national census must include the "whole number of persons in each state."
“The proposed rule will fundamentally change the quality of the 2030 census count," said Nathan Dollar, director of Carolina Demography at UNC-Chapel Hill. "It imperils the public’s access to objective data more generally."
The NC Counts Coalition is campaigning to inform public on how to submit comments on the proposal through Oct. 13.
