October 31 Upheld As Census Deadline
A federal judge issued an order Oct. 1 to clarify that the U.S. Census Bureau must continue counting for the 2020 census through Oct. 31 after finding the bureau made multiple violations of an earlier order that extends the national head count’s schedule.
The latest ruling by U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh comes after days of confusion sparked by a one-sentence tweet from the Census Bureau that Koh called the “most egregious violation” of the preliminary injunction order.
The bureau released the tweet minutes before the judge began a virtual conference Monday for a lawsuit over the Trump administration’s push to cut the census short. It said that Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who oversees the bureau, had announced Oct. 5 as a “target date” for ending all counting efforts. Internal emails and other documents show that Ross chose that date to deliver the first set of census results, the latest state population counts, to President Trump by Dec. 31 despite the judge’s order prohibiting the administration from implementing Dec. 31 as a deadline.
