Alabama Gon' Sue The Census For Letting Mexicans Exist
Congressman Mo Brooks and his home state of Alabama are madder than a passel of wet hens that they're going to lose a congressional seat in the upcoming census because, with all due respect, ain't nobody moving to Alabama. So they're suing the federal government to stop them counting undocumented immigrants in the Census as God, Abraham Lincoln, and White Jesus intended. Article II of the Constitution mandates a count of all the "persons in each state," and the Supreme Court held in 2016's Evenwell v. Abbott that legislative districts must be drawn counting total population, not just "voters." But Congressman Brooks knows that swarthy immigrants are all part of an evil Democratic plot to "rob[] the people of the State of Alabama of their rightful share of political representation while systematically redistributing political power to states with high numbers of illegal aliens and their citizens."
A robbery? Oh my stars and garters! Someone fetch Congressman Brooks a divan and a glass of sweet tea, he seems to have a touch of the vapors.
As Congressman Brooks was saying, the Constitution says we have to count all "people." But are ILLEGAL ALIENS even "people" anyway? Mo Brooks thinks not!
The phrase "persons in each State" was understood at both the Founding and in the Reconstruction era to be restricted to aliens who have been lawfully admitted to the body politic constituted by the Constitution. Aliens who are unlawfully present in the United States did not qualify because they are not entitled to political representation. U.S. Const. art 1, § 2, cl. 3 Thus, the actual enumeration of the population of the states cannot include such aliens.
That's a view entirely inconsistent with Supreme Court precedent, but it's completely in line with recently deceased Republican mapfucker Thomas Hofeller's final solution to enshrine white power by adding a citizenship question to the Census, which would then generate federal data to draw districts based on total eligible voters, rather than on actual residents of the district. And like magic, diverse neighborhoods with young families would magically count as three-fifths the population of older, whiter retirement communities, once you subtract all those pesky kids from the count. Really, the allusion to Reconstruction is the cherry on top!
And Republicans, facing a country that is younger, browner, and increasingly loathes the GOP for being a bunch of greedy assholes, are totally onboard with Hofeller's plan. That's why the RNC gave him $4 million in the 10 years before his death. In fact, as Mother Jones reports, Hofeller was paid $422,000 by the Trump campaign -- that's monthly payments of $22,247 -- from the inauguration until Hofeller's death in August of last year.
But, please, GO OFF, Commerce Department about it being "smoke and mirrors" that parts of Hofeller's memo on the citizenship question coincidentally wound up in multiple Justice Department communications with the Census Bureau. Tell us more, Secretary Ross, about how the citizenship question is being added to ensure minority representation under the Voting Rights Act, rather than to entrench Republicans as minority ruling party for all eternity.
It's not that the White House disagrees with Rep. Brooks's lawsuit -- clearly they're all on the same page here trying to ratfuck the maps to be, as Hofeller put it, "advantageous to Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites." It's just that they'd like the congressman to SHHHHHH, BE QUIET right now and stop raising a ruckus. Clearly the Supreme Court is going to disregard all the evidence that Secretary Ross and his minions are lying about adding the citizenship question to protect minority voters and ensure an accurate count. Which means that, in 2020, Hispanic and Latino residents will be undercounted by at least 4 million. And then maybe if they can shove one more Federalist Society loon onto the Supreme Court the GOP can get rid of "One Person, One Vote" entirely -- as Clarence Thomas has suggested -- and then move to drawing legislative districts based on only white adult voters.
So IXNAY ON THE AWSUITLAW, OOKSBRAY! Except, a federal judge in Alabama ruled yesterday that Brooks and the state do have standing to sue the Commerce Department, which tees up this case to head to SCOTUS some time next year. Maybe after they get the citizenship question added, they can ratfuck the districts permanently!
Subtle, aren't they?
[Brooks v. Department of Commerce, Complaint / Alabama v. Department of Commerce, Memorandum Opinion / MoJo / NYT]
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Liz Dye lives in Baltimore with her wonderful husband and a houseful of teenagers. When she isn't being mad about a thing on the internet, she's hiding in plain sight in the carpool line. She's the one wearing yoga pants glaring at her phone.
