Well, this would be surprising if true.

Yesterday, RedState’s streiff wrote on what looked like pretty rock solid reporting that the administration had fully caved on the citizenship question being put on the census. This came on the heels of the Supreme Court ruling the inclusion of the question was constitutional, yet Roberts crossed over to the liberals to assert that Commerce would need to resubmit their reasoning for scrutiny.

The timing, with the census forms needing to go to printer already, made it seem like something that couldn’t be pursued further.

Maybe things have changed though?

The News Reports about the Department of Commerce dropping its quest to put the Citizenship Question on the Census is incorrect or, to state it differently, FAKE! We are absolutely moving forward, as we must, because of the importance of the answer to this question.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 3, 2019

For Donald Trump’s sake, this had better be true. He’s cried wolf a few too many times in the past month and he doesn’t need another hit.

What I suspect happened here is that the original statement shown was true, but that Trump didn’t like the backlash and has reversed course. That’s fine. Better to do the right thing late than stick with the wrong thing.

There is no reason whatsoever that a question that was on the census for 175 years can’t and shouldn’t be re-added. The statutory authority to do so is clear. Apportionment for the House is based on census results and it’s clearly against the intent of the Equal Protection Clause to continue to allow areas with high populations of illegal immigrants to garner extra seats.

Print the question and move forward. The Supreme Court has already affirmed the legality of doing so and this decision came down way too late to force such a change. The rest is bureaucratic nonsense that can be fought later.

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