Shocker: Arizona Will NOT Gain A Tenth Congressional District (Updated)

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The Census Bureau just held a press conference on the population numbers to be used for congressional reapportionment, and shocker: Arizona will NOT gain a tenth congressional district as literally everyone has assumed. WTF?

Here is the press release from the Census Bureau. 2020 Census Apportionment Results Delivered to the President:

APRIL 26, 2021 – The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that the 2020 Census shows the resident population of the United States on April 1, 2020, was 331,449,281.

The U.S. resident population represents the total number of people living in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The resident population increased by 22,703,743 or 7.4% from 308,745,538 in 2010.

“The American public deserves a big thank you for its overwhelming response to the 2020 Census,” Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said. “Despite many challenges, our nation completed a census for the 24th time. This act is fundamental to our democracy and a declaration of our growth and resilience. I also want to thank the team at the U.S. Census Bureau, who overcame unprecedented challenges to collect and produce high-quality data that will inform decision-making for years to come.”

“We are proud to release these first results from the 2020 Census today. These results reflect the tireless commitment from the entire Census Bureau team to produce the highest-quality statistics that will continue to shape the future of our country,” acting Census Bureau Director Ron Jarmin said. “And in a first for the Census Bureau, we are releasing data quality metrics on the same day we’re making the resident population counts available to the public. We are confident that today’s 2020 Census results meet our high data quality standards.”

The new resident population statistics for the United States, each of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico are available on census.gov.

      • The most populous state was California (39,538,223); the least populous was Wyoming (576,851).
      • The state that gained the most numerically since the 2010 Census was Texas (up 3,999,944 to 29,145,505).
      • The fastest-growing state since the 2010 Census was Utah (up 18.4% to 3,271,616).
      • Puerto Rico’s resident population was 3,285,874, down 11.8% from 3,725,789 in the 2010 Census.

In addition to these newly released statistics, today Secretary Raimondo delivered to President Biden the population counts to be used for apportioning the seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. In accordance with Title 2 of the U.S. Code, a congressionally defined formula is applied to the apportionment population to distribute the 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives among the states.

The apportionment population consists of the resident population of the 50 states, plus the overseas military and federal civilian employees and their dependents living with them overseas who could be allocated to a home state. The populations of the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico are excluded from the apportionment population because they do not have voting seats in Congress. The counts of overseas federal employees (and their dependents) are used for apportionment purposes only.

      • After the 1790 Census, each member of the House represented about 34,000 residents. Since then, the House has more than quadrupled in size (from 105 to 435 seats), and each member will represent an average of 761,169 people based on the 2020 Census.
      • Texas will gain two seats in the House of Representatives, five states will gain one seat each (Colorado, Florida, Montana, North Carolina, and Oregon), seven states will lose one seat each (California, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia), and the remaining states’ [including Arizona] number of seats will not change based on the 2020 Census.

Upon receipt of the apportionment counts, the president will transmit them to the 117th Congress. The reapportioned Congress will be the 118th, which convenes in January 2023.

“Our work doesn’t stop here,” added acting Director Jarmin. “Now that the apportionment counts are delivered, we will begin the additional activities needed to create and deliver the redistricting data that were previously delayed due to COVID-19.”

Redistricting data include the local area counts states need to redraw or “redistrict” legislative boundaries. Due to modifications to processing activities, COVID-19 data collections delays, and the Census Bureau’s obligation to provide high-quality data, states are expected to receive redistricting data by August 16, and the full redistricting data with toolkits for ease of use will be delivered by September 30. The Census Bureau will notify the public prior to releasing the data.

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Remember that back in November, “a skeptical Supreme Court … reacted with frustration and some confusion to President Trump’s plan to exclude unauthorized immigrants from the calculations used to allocate seats in the House. Supreme Court Skeptical of Trump’s Plan to Not Count Unauthorized Immigrants in Redistricting:

While there was some discussion about whether the plan was lawful, the more immediate questions for the justices were where the administration stood in its efforts to identify and count the unauthorized immigrants and what role the court should play if substantial numbers were not identified.

Removing undocumented immigrants from the census would most likely have the effect of shifting congressional seats and federal money to states that are older, whiter and typically more Republican.

But if the Census Bureau cannot provide Mr. Trump with specific information about a large enough number of unauthorized immigrants in the coming weeks, he will not be able to exclude enough of them from the reapportionment to change the way House seats are allocated. That would leave the justices without a concrete dispute to decide.

This is exactly what happened. President Biden then reversed Trump’s unconstitutional policy upon taking office. Biden Ends Trump Census Policy, Ensuring All Persons Living In U.S. Are Counted.

But the damage may have already have been done, discouraging undocumented immigrants from complying with the 2020 Census out of fear of being identified for possible deportation, resulting in a substantial Census undercount. (2020 definitely qualifies as an asterisk year when additionally factoring in a global Coronavirus pandemic.)

You can thank the anti-immigrant policy of Donald Trump and the GQP for Arizona not getting a tenth congressional seat.

UPDATE: Elvia Diaz of The Republic adds, Does anyone believe Arizona didn’t grow enough to earn a 10th congressional seat? (excerpt):

Does anyone really believe Arizona doesn’t have enough people to add a 10th congressional seat?

That’s just crazy.

But officially that just happened, meaning Arizona will stay with nine House seats for the next decade.

Arizona was widely expected to gain one House seat, but somehow population growth stagnated or too many people didn’t fill out the Census form.

Estimates from earlier this year had suggested Arizona might be the fifth-fastest growing state, but it ranked eighth in the initial Census tally. Arizona had 6.4 million residents in 2010 and 7.1 million in 2020.

It’s not that difficult to figure out what happened here. Former President Donald Trump clearly succeeded in politicizing the decennial Census to keep an undercount.

Trump scared the heck out of those living here illegally by trying to add a citizenship status question. Add to that other factors like lack of internet in rural communities and the fallout of the coronavirus pandemic and my guess is you end up with an undercount.

This isn’t just a political setback. Arizona also stands to lose an incalculable amount of money for the next decade.

Rachel Maddow reviews the ways that the Donald Trump administration tried to ensure an undercount of the people living in the United States in a way that would benefit Republicans politically, and the questions that raises now that the census numbers are being published.

UPDATE:





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6 thoughts on “Shocker: Arizona Will NOT Gain A Tenth Congressional District (Updated)”

  1. The Republic’s Laurie Roberts places the blame close to home. “Blame Gov. Doug Ducey for Arizona’s poor census showing”, https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2021/04/29/gov-doug-ducey-blame-arizonas-poor-census-showing/7403330002/

    It’s becoming increasingly and oh so painfully clear why Arizona, one of the fastest growing states in the nation, may have lost out on picking up another seat in Congress.

    Two words: Doug Ducey.

  2. We had that idiot, Arpaio, for years. We had the befuddled Brewer. We have a state political party that has scaremongered immigration in every election since seemingly Teddy Roosevelt. Will the voters ever wake up? A little here and there. But seemingly never with the Putinlike one party dictatorship in the legislative majority, to make Arizona the constant laughingstock.

  3. “Over the past decade, the United States population grew at the second slowest rate since the government started counting in 1790 – since the Great Depression of the 1930s – the Census Bureau reported on Monday, a remarkable slackening that was driven by a slowdown in immigration and a declining birthrate.”
    “U.S. Population Over Last Decade Grew at Slowest Rate Since 1930s”, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/26/us/us-census-numbers.html

    The new decennial census counted 331,449,281 Americans as of April 1, 2020, said Dr. Ron Jarmin, the acting director of the Census Bureau. The total was up by 7.4 percent over the previous decade, slightly more than in the 1930s, when the population grew by just 7.3 percent. In that period, the birthrate rose once the economy started to climb out of the Great Depression. But this time it has continued to decline, after dropping in the wake of the Great Recession in 2008.

    The lower birthrate, combined with the decline in inflows of immigrants and shifting age demographics — there are now more Americans 80 and older than 2 or younger — means the United States may be entering an era of substantially lower population growth, demographers said. This would put the United States in line with the countries of Europe and East Asia that face serious long-term challenges with rapidly aging populations.

    Another defining feature of the decade was the fall in immigration. The rates of new immigrants had been rising for years, since a modern low in the 1970s. But they mostly leveled off after the Great Recession in 2008, and went into decline during the coronavirus pandemic, said Jeffrey Passel, senior demographer at the Pew Research Center.

    Mr. Passel said the drivers were a worsening economy in the United States and tougher enforcement on the border with Mexico, especially after 2010. Also important, he said, were Mexico’s improving economy and its own lower birthrate.

    “The change in the Mexican flows is really what caused immigration to level off,” Mr. Passel said, noting that Mexico had been the biggest source of immigration to the United States for years. He has calculated that, throughout the decade, there were more unauthorized Mexican immigrants leaving the United States than arriving.

    The tapering of immigration over all has added to population woes in some states. Over the last decade, three had outright population declines: West Virginia, Mississippi and Illinois.

  4. Fuck Trump but at least we have Biden to toss that malignant “immigrants separate” policy that reminds me of the Jews being lined up in Nazi Germany.

    Don’t forget the Citizenship case, 5-4 for us.

    Steve Bannon and Kris Kobach were twisting Wilbur Ross’ arm to put the citizenship question on the survey to” help with Voters Rights.”

    Roberts found that argument contrived and told them to look for another rationale.

    That was a stupid directive that made for more chaos.

  5. This will not be good news for current Governor Doug Ducey, who may have been eyeing the potential new Congressional seat. Now he only has the US Senate race to consider, against Democratic incumbent Senator Mark Kelly.

  6. This has got to disappoint numerous, anti-government, but ambitious legislators, who were just eyeing a chance to got a better gov’ment job.

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