Department of Commerce v. New York

In 2018, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced a citizenship question for the 2020 Census, citing the need to enforce the Voting Rights Act. Multiple states, cities, and advocacy groups sued, alleging violations of the Enumeration Clause and the Administrative Procedure Act, and arguing that the question would suppress responses from immigrant communities. A federal district court in New York blocked the question, finding the Secretary's stated justification pretextual. The Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision on June 27, 2019, ruled that the explanation provided by the Commerce Department was insufficient and arbitrary, and remanded the case for further justification. This effectively blocked the question from appearing on the 2020 census.

The Supreme Court affirmed the district court's judgment, holding that the Commerce Department's stated reasoning was contrived and violated the Administrative Procedure Act as arbitrary and capricious. The case was remanded for the agency to provide a genuine explanation, and the citizenship question was ultimately not added to the 2020 census.

Whether the Secretary of Commerce's decision to add a citizenship question violated the Enumeration Clause of the Constitution or the Administrative Procedure Act, specifically whether the stated rationale based on the Voting Rights Act was a pretext for impermissible discriminatory motives.

The ruling prevented the inclusion of a citizenship question that could have caused significant undercounts in immigrant communities, affecting congressional apportionment and federal funding distribution. It also affirmed judicial oversight of administrative decisions, reinforcing that agencies cannot rely on pretextual justifications to implement policy changes.