From WaPo Ed Board, an update on where we are with the Census...
HERE IS one of the least surprising revelations ever leaked from the federal government: According to an internal Census Bureau document, major, uncorrectable errors may result from forcing the bureau’s enumerators and number-crunchers to rush through the decennial count.
House Oversight and Reform Committee Chair Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.) revealed the document this month, claiming it was a presentation for Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who oversees the bureau. It shows that the decision of Senate Republicans and the Trump administration to give the bureau no more time to finish a count that started late and ...
has encountered pandemic-related problems threatens to corrupt for a decade the process of distributing congressional seats and doling out some $1.5 trillion in annual federal aid.
To be clear, this would not be the fault of the bureau’s professionals, whom Republicans have put in an impossible position. They are facing a statutory deadline requiring that they deliver their count by Dec. 31. The bureau had previously asked for more time. House Democrats authorized a deadline extension.
Senate Republicans failed to do so, and the Trump administration ordered last month that door-knocking conclude by Sept. 30, weeks earlier than the experts had hoped.
The Senate should have passed a covid-19 relief bill months ago, with a census deadline extension in it. With the bureau up against a wall, senators should not wait to agree on the rest of a relief package to give the counters more time. The census needs clarity, now.
Increasingly if not totally, the Republican party governs by not governing, in example after example, when there is action to take, no action is taken.
This is NOT Governance, this is undocumented anarchy of tail wagging.