The inclusion of non-citizens for purposes ofHouse apportionment would reduce, or dilute, the political influence ofcitizens in House elections.
Last week’s Legislative Update provided details about an amendmentfiled by Senator David Vitter to the Fiscal Year (FY) 2010 Commerce,Justice, Science (CJS) appropriations bill. (FAIR’s Legislative Update,October 19, 2009). The Vitter amendment would require the CensusBureau to ask questions about citizenship and immigration status aspart of the 2010 decennial census. (See The Stein Report, October 19, 2009; for more information on how prior censuses have included questions on citizenship see The Stein Report, October 26, 2009).
The Vitter amendment is very important and brings with it seriousimplications about a variety of issues. For example, Census data willbe used to “apportion” Congressional seats to each state. Ifnon-citizens are used for purposes of Congressional apportionment,Senator Vitter’s office has said that nine states with lower illegalimmigration and lower foreign-born populations would end up losing aseat in the U.S. House of Representatives, while four states would pickthose seats up. (CQ Today, October 22, 2009).
Theimplications are that the inclusion of non-citizens for purposes ofHouse apportionment would reduce, or dilute, the political influence ofcitizens in House elections. FAIR conducted a similar analysis inSeptember 2008 regarding the impact of including non-citizens in theapportionment process. (See FAIR’s Report: Who Represents Illegal Aliens?, September 2008).
Another area where the Census will matter is with respect to thedistribution of federal funds under programs based on population. According to the census bureau, state populations are used to determinehow nearly $400 billion is allocated in federal spending every year. If the census does not ask citizenship and immigration questions,states with higher illegal alien populations will get more federalfunds at the expense of states with lower illegal alien populations. As a result, a few states will get money they shouldn’t, while the vastmajority of states will be short-changed out of their fair share. (Fora detailed discussion of this issue, listen to FAIR’s October 26, 2009podcast, here).