{"id":14799,"date":"2025-12-12T18:14:50","date_gmt":"2025-12-12T18:14:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=14799"},"modified":"2025-12-12T18:17:43","modified_gmt":"2025-12-12T18:17:43","slug":"a-national-gop-push-to-exclude-noncitizens-from-future-redistricting-could-have-big-ramifications-in-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=14799","title":{"rendered":"A national GOP push to exclude noncitizens from future redistricting could have big ramifications in Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Some Republicans only want citizens included in population counts used to draw political districts. In Texas, that raises important questions about power and representation.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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By Natalia Contreras<\/a>, Votebeat and The Texas Tribune<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This coverage is made possible through Votebeat<\/a>, a nonpartisan news organization covering local election administration and voting access. Sign up for Votebeat Texas\u2019 free newsletters here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The impacts of the latest fight over Texas\u2019 political maps<\/a> are still reverberating around the state, but there are other debates on the horizon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Future political representation could hinge on President Donald Trump\u2019s renewed push to exclude at least some noncitizens from the population counts<\/a> that help determine how political power is distributed in the U.S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Texas, where Republicans pushed through a rare midcycle redistricting<\/a> this year to try to maintain their advantage in Congress after the 2026 midterm elections, experts say that excluding noncitizens when drawing districts could open another way for the GOP to tighten its grip on the state Legislature and congressional delegation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, many experts and critics worry it could ultimately place some Texas communities into larger, less cohesive districts, while diluting the political influence of Latinos and other minority groups who have accounted for much of the state\u2019s population gain in recent decades. Adding questions about citizenship to the U.S. census could also lead to more undercounting of Latinos, they warn, a problem that has plagued previous censuses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The various proposals raise substantial undecided legal and constitutional questions that would have to be settled in court, making the outcomes of such changes impossible to precisely predict. But to understand the possibilities if some or any of these proposals go forward, it\u2019s helpful to separate them into three categories: changes to the census; changes to the apportionment of House seats and electoral votes among states; and changes to the drawing of congressional and state legislative districts, which happens at the state level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How we count people \u2014 and which people count<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Any effort to reanchor the distribution of political power around citizenship starts with the decennial census. Republicans<\/a> and conservative groups<\/a> are lining up behind a continuing effort to add a citizenship question<\/a> to the questionnaire, a plan that ran into legal hurdles during the first Trump administration<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under the Constitution, the decennial census \u2014 \u201ccounting the whole number of persons in each State\u201d every 10 years \u2014 determines how many congressional representatives and electoral votes each state gets. As courts have interpreted this clause in the past, it means everyone is counted<\/a>, regardless of their age, immigration or citizenship status, or eligibility to vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump has pushed this year<\/a> for a new, mid-decade census that would not count immigrants without legal status<\/a>. But the census has a long lead time. The Census Bureau says it\u2019s been preparing<\/a> for the 2030 census since 2019 and is planning to conduct a major on-the-ground test for it in 2026. The commerce secretary must submit census questions to Congress two years before the actual census takes place<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are also several Republican-supported bills<\/a> that would affect<\/a> the census\u2019s counting of noncitizens. They differ, but they generally call for using only the number of U.S. citizens<\/a>, rather than the total population, to calculate how to apportion House seats and electoral votes among the states. Four Republican-led states earlier this year also sued the federal government<\/a>, arguing that undocumented immigrants and immigrants with temporary visas shouldn\u2019t be included, though that case has been stayed for now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some Republicans who support the proposals argue that including noncitizens creates imbalances in citizens\u2019 voting power depending on where they live \u2014 rewarding jurisdictions that welcome undocumented immigrants<\/a>. \u201cToday, a voter in a congressional district with 730,000 citizens \u2026 and 30,000 illegal aliens has a stronger say in the election of his representative than a voter in a congressional district with 760,000 citizens and no illegal immigrants,\u201d U.S. Rep. Chip Roy,<\/a> R-Austin, said during a congressional committee hearing on the census in November.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Democrats, meanwhile, said the proposals would be unconstitutional and would hurt vulnerable populations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAlexander Hamilton is on record saying during the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, \u2018There can be no truer principle than this: that every individual of the community at large has an equal right to the protection of the government,\u2019\u201d said U.S. Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon, a Pennsylvania Democrat. \u201cUltimately, the census is a national snapshot we take every 10 years that helps us understand and define who we are, how to govern, and undermining that process in ways that distort that picture will harm all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If all or some noncitizens were to be excluded from the census, states estimated to have large populations of noncitizens \u2014 a red and blue mix that includes Texas, California, New Jersey, Florida, and New York \u2014 could lose House seats and electoral votes<\/a>, or gain fewer than they would have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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But multiple legal experts, including Justin Levitt, a constitutional law expert and professor at Loyola Law School who advised President Joe Biden\u2019s administration on democracy and voting rights, and Michael Morley, a law professor at Florida State University\u2019s College of Law and an expert on election and constitutional law and voting rights, say excluding all or some noncitizens from apportionment counts would be unconstitutional, given the clear language on apportionment in the Constitution\u2019s 14th Amendment<\/a>. It would quickly draw legal challenges, and they don\u2019t believe courts would allow it, they said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But if the Trump administration adds a census question on citizenship, which wouldn\u2019t in itself change the apportionment counts, that would generate the key data state officials would need to draw their internal U.S. House and state legislative district lines based on the population of citizens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a 2016 case over state-level redistricting in Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court left open the question<\/a> of whether states could use criteria other than total population, such as the population of eligible voters \u2014 roughly speaking, citizens age 18 or above \u2014 for the state-level task of drawing district maps. Texas, according to the court\u2019s ruling in Evenwel v. Abbott, had argued that \u201cjurisdictions may, consistent with the Equal Protection Clause, design districts using any population baseline\u2014including total population and voter-eligible population\u2014so long as the choice is rational and not invidiously discriminatory.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Experts disagree, however, on whether the Supreme Court has left the question open for both congressional districts and state legislative districts or just for state legislative districts. Morley, for example, said the former, while Levitt believes the latter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the failed push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, evidence emerged showing a longtime political strategist had drawn up a case study showing that using the population of voting-age citizens rather than total population to draw Texas state House districts would advantage Republicans and non-Hispanic white Texans<\/a>. That\u2019s a big reason why some experts and advocates are concerned about the implications for communities of color.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If Texas draws districts to have equal populations of adult citizens rather than equal total populations, some districts would have to grow geographically to include enough adult citizens \u2014 creating districts that are larger geographically and by total population. The effects of using citizen voting-age population would likely be most pronounced in the Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston areas and in the Rio Grande Valley, according to experts and an analysis by the Electoral Innovation Lab done earlier this year for Votebeat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The effect will \u201ctend to be to shift power away from urban areas that have larger numbers of noncitizens,\u201d Morley said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In these districts, U.S. citizens would see an impact as well. Individuals would have less representation if everyone isn\u2019t counted, said Jonathan Cervas, a redistricting expert, assistant teaching professor at Carnegie Mellon University, and collaborator with the Electoral Innovation Lab.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the real-world consequence\u201d of redistricting based on citizen-only population counts in those areas, he said. Actual citizens \u201cend up worse off.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s look at an example: The Rio Grande Valley<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Rio Grande Valley is one of the areas where new political boundaries based on citizenship voting-age population could have a profound effect, according to the analysis by Cervas, Neil Dixit, and Sam Wang of the Electoral Innovation Lab, as well as other redistricting experts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Near the eastern end of the Texas-Mexico border, neighboring Hidalgo and Cameron counties are home to more than 1 million people combined. The area has a diverse population that works in manufacturing, agriculture, healthcare, retail, and food service industries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both counties also have multiple ports of entry between Mexico and the U.S., overwhelmingly Latino populations, and many mixed-status households.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The area is also home to more than 1,000 colonias \u2014 unincorporated rural communities that often lack access to basic services and infrastructure \u2014 housing anywhere from two dozen to over a thousand each.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The area is part of the Democratic-leaning 34th Congressional District<\/a>, which, as it stands now<\/a>, includes eastern Hidalgo County and all of Cameron, Kenedy, Kleberg, and Willacy counties. (The map state lawmakers passed this summer<\/a> takes the Hidalgo County part of the district out and instead adds part of Nueces County.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the district had to be redrawn based on its citizen voting-age population, it would almost certainly need to grow geographically, according to an analysis by Cervas, because otherwise there wouldn\u2019t be enough citizens in it to keep it equal to other districts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lupita Sanchez, a resident of Brownsville in Cameron County and executive director of Border Workers United, a nonpartisan immigrant advocacy nonprofit, said redistricting should be fair. \u201cEveryone should be counted because everyone contributes to this nation in different ways,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why the census citizenship question matters<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The first Trump administration fell short in its push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the administration\u2019s stated reasons for wanting to add the question were contrived<\/a> \u2014 but it didn\u2019t preclude asking it on a future census.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aside from apportionment and redistricting, census data helps inform how trillions of dollars<\/a> in funding are allocated to states to improve health, housing, education, and other community services. It helps businesses plan investments and local governments decide how to allocate resources, such as services for the elderly and where to build new roads, schools, or job training centers. So the developers of the census questionnaire strive to tread lightly with any change that might diminish response rates or compromise the completeness of the data they collect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Census questionnaires are distributed to individual addresses and capture answers about everyone in the household. Even though the answers are not released to the public and are used only to generate statistics, experts have long said<\/a> that adding a citizenship question would make some people, especially immigrants, less likely to respond to the census, resulting in less accurate data and further diminishing the political influence of some communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Republican push to add a citizenship question \u201cis designed to deepen the distrust and therefore trigger an even higher undercount, specifically of the Latino community,\u201d said Thomas Saenz, president and general counsel at the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which opposed the first Trump administration\u2019s 2020 effort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMistrust runs deep,\u201d said Victoria Fajardo, a resident of Hidalgo County in the Rio Grande Valley and a community advocate with the immigrant and social services advocacy group La Union del Pueblo Entero (LUPE). That\u2019s especially true in \u201cmixed-status households\u201d \u2014 families with U.S. citizens and noncitizens, including legal permanent residents and undocumented immigrants, under one roof. Around 8% of Texas households include an undocumented immigrant, according to Pew Research Center estimates<\/a> from 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People fear their personal information could be shared with government agencies for enforcement reasons, Fajardo said. Adding a citizenship question to the census \u201cwould just further the undercounting of the community. Especially under this administration,\u201d she said, \u201cwhere it feels like surveillance of immigrants is heightened.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The census has already undercounted the population<\/a> in parts of the Rio Grande Valley in the past, advocates say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prominent Texas officials supported Trump\u2019s effort<\/a> to add the citizenship question to the 2020 census, and Texas also joined a multistate brief<\/a> filed with the Supreme Court in favor of the Trump administration\u2019s position. In 2019, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott<\/a> said the idea that it would lead to an undercount was \u201cnothing other than conjecture<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How redistricting is supposed to work<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Each state\u2019s political maps must be redrawn <\/a>once per decade, after each census, to account for population growth and ensure that every congressional or legislative district has virtually the same number of people. Mid-decade redistricting, like the one Texas pushed through this year, is legal but unusual \u2014 although Trump\u2019s push to add red seats in some states has set off a chain reaction of it<\/a> this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Texas and most other states, redistricting is the purview of the state legislature and governor, and if one party controls both, it can draw the boundaries for both congressional districts and state legislative districts as it sees fit. Within certain limits, state lawmakers can effectively decide which voters they want in each district, based on political or partisan objectives. The practice goes back centuries, but modern data tools have made it easier to precisely draw boundaries that include or exclude certain voters and maximize partisan advantage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other states, it\u2019s up to a bipartisan or independent commission to oversee redistricting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are a few rules and principles that apply in all states. For example, a given state\u2019s districts must have virtually equal populations. All states must comply with the 14th Amendment to the Constitution and the Voting Rights Act<\/a>, which means they can\u2019t discriminate on the basis of race \u2014 though a U.S. Supreme Court decision is pending in a case out of Louisiana<\/a> that could drastically change how the Voting Rights Act applies to redistricting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are also widely applied redistricting principles<\/a> that call for districts to be, among other things, compact and contiguous and to preserve communities of interest and follow other lines, such as city boundaries, whenever possible. And several states have specific requirements of their own: In Texas, for example, lawmakers must also comply with the state constitution\u2019s requirements<\/a> when it comes to splitting counties between state House districts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Courts have found Texas\u2019 congressional maps to be racially gerrymandered in every decade from the 1970s to the 2010s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The maps that Texas Republicans drew after the 2020 census were under challenge in court when lawmakers decided to redraw the state\u2019s congressional map this summer, though judges had yet to rule. The new map was promptly challenged in court as well, and in November, a panel of federal judges struck down the map<\/a> as a racial gerrymander. However, their decision was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled Dec. 4<\/a> that Texas could use its new congressional map while the high court considers the merits of the case. That makes it likely that the congressional map lawmakers passed this summer will be used in the 2026 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natalia Contreras is a reporter for Votebeat in partnership with The Texas Tribune. She is based in Corpus Christi. Contact Natalia at ncontreras@votebeat.org.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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