On May 21, 2018, Alabama and a Representative from its Fifth Congressional District (Morris J. Brooks, Jr.) filed this lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama. The case was assigned to District Judge R. David Proctor. The plaintiffs sued the United States Department of Commerce and its agency, the Bureau of the Census, under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and the Declaratory Judgments Act, alleging violations of the APA, the Fourteenth Amendment’s Congressional Apportionment and Electoral College Apportionment Clauses, and the Actual Enumeration Clause of Article I § 2 of the Constitution.

The plaintiffs, represented by the Alabama Attorney General, sought injunctive and declaratory relief. The plaintiffs alleged that the Census Bureau’s policy of including all U.S. residents, regardless of their citizenship status, in the census count totals used for apportioning congressional seats and electoral college votes, was unconstitutional. The plaintiffs specifically alleged that including undocumented individuals in the population count deprived Alabama of its “rightful share of political representation,” because it had fewer undocumented immigrants relative to other states. The state also alleged that counting undocumented individuals violated the Constitution’s provisions governing congressional apportionment and the electoral college, as well as the federal government’s constitutional duty to conduct an “actual enumeration” of the population. The plaintiff claimed that it was harmed when it received less federal funding than other states because of its relatively low level of undocumented immigrants. The plaintiffs further argued that the Bureau’s policy of counting undocumented individuals was “arbitrary and capricious” and “contrary to law” under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).

On December 13, 2018, two groups - one consisting of the City of San Jose (California), King County (Washington), and the County of Santa Clara (California), and the other consisting of Chicanos Por La Causa and several individuals - were granted permission to intervene. As of February 2019, the parties were briefing the Department of Commerce's motion to dismiss. 

The case is ongoing.

Michael Beech - 02/09/2019


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