by Meeta Anand, Beth Jarosz, and Chris Dick
On September 10, 2026 the Census Bureau posted a notice in the Federal Register titled “Decennial Census of the Population of Americans; Proposed Residence Criteria and Proposed Regulations for Demographic Questions.” Despite the stale-sounding title, this proposed rule upends nearly 250 years of history, ignores Constitutional mandates, will make life harder for all Americans, and proposes to codify all of those changes into the Code of Federal Regulations (rather than, as is traditional, Census Bureau policy).
The goal of every census is to “count everyone once, only once, and in the right place.” Not only is that catchphrase memorable, it is the outgrowth of the mandates of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution regarding apportionment. In addition to being the foundation of political representation, the population count in each decennial census is the common denominator in nearly every aspect of public life. Census counts are used for emergency preparation and disaster response. They are used to plan for schools, roads, and hospitals. They are used to track crime rates and to monitor public health. They are used to understand whether we are making progress in alleviating historic patterns of discrimination. They are used to understand employment patterns and economic opportunity. They are used by businesses to understand their workforce and customer base in order to make sound investments. These examples are just the tip of the iceberg—a comprehensive list could go on for pages (in fact the Census Bureau published a list of 50 common uses).
The proposed changes will lead to a census that counts only part of the population, and will contain limited demographic information. These changes, and their knock-on effects on response rates, will lead to inaccuracies and insufficient demographic data that will hobble not only the decennial census itself, but our ability as a society to make evidence-based decisions.
The U.S. would no longer have a complete and accurate count of the population.
The proposed rule states that citizens of foreign countries who are “also either citizens or lawful permanent residents of the United States” would be “counted at their usual residence,” but that all other citizens of foreign countries would not be “counted for apportionment.” Although the decennial census never counted foreign tourists or business travelers, it has always counted residents. Under the new rule, many residents would—for the first time—be excluded from the apportionment count. International students, work visa holders, recognized refugees and asylees, and other residents would be ignored.
In addition to this proposed rule being inconsistent with the Constitutional mandate to count all persons, implementing such a change will have a chilling effect on the count more broadly (including in households with citizens). This means that even if the Census Bureau attempts to produce two products—one with a count of all residents and one with just citizens and legal permanent residents—neither will reflect an accurate and complete count of the population.
The fallout from losing an accurate count of the population cannot be overstated. Impacts will range from poor public health decisions to increased traffic. Funding will go to the wrong places. Schools won’t have enough seats for incoming students. Public safety decisions will be based on inaccurate crime rates. Wait times will get longer for healthcare. Business decisions will be based on faulty information. And evacuating people during an emergency will be more difficult.
What are “residence criteria” and how would they be used to change who “counts?”
Residence criteria are rules that determine where people are counted during a census and are based on the concept of “usual residence.” For many people, usual residence is fairly straightforward: it’s the home where we live. But not everyone has just one, long-term home. Some people have more than one home, including college students and people who own multiple properties. Some people move from place to place frequently (such as seasonal workers, traveling nurses, adventurers, and unhoused people). Some people may be away from home temporarily, such as people who are hospitalized or incarcerated. Military personnel may be deployed during the period the census is being conducted.
Residence criteria set standards to ensure that everyone is counted in the right place (such as a college student at their dorm or a hospitalized person at their usual home). The criteria proposed in this rule, however, make some sweeping changes that raise practical and legal questions. Some key residence criteria changes include:
Defining usual residence as someplace outside of the U.S. even for those who are present legally and/or have lived in the U.S. for years, thus excluding many residents from the count.
Hinting at the possibility of adding an untested citizenship and immigration status question to the questionnaire to facilitate removing people from the count.
Inserting language that “A person’s ‘usual residence’ should be consistent with, and evidenced by, their tax records (e.g., tax returns, W-2 forms),” despite numerous situations in which those two may be inconsistent.
Setting an unprecedented “reference period” (from January 3 to April 1 of the census year) for defining a person’s usual residence.
People will be counted in the wrong place.
These proposed changes raise several red flags that people will not be counted in the right place. First, in a total break from every census since 1790 and from requirements in Title 13 (which requires an enumeration based on a census date rather than a census period), the Census Bureau is “proposing to define the relevant ‘census enumeration period’ to run from January 3 to April 1 during decennial census years.” This means that many people who have more than one home will be counted in their winter location, rather than the place where they spend most of their time, pay taxes, and vote. The anticipated effect of this proposed rule is that it would shift population from colder, northern states to southern “snowbird” destinations.
This proposed reference period would also cause confusion for anyone who moves during the reference period. Usual residence has always been understood to be where you will live and sleep most of the time as of the census date. Movers in March, for example, may feel compelled to report their prior address rather than their residence on Census Day (April 1).
Another red flag is new language related to tax records. The text of the proposed rule reads:
“(a) A person’s “usual residence” is the residence at which they have lawfully spent the greatest number of days during the census enumeration period. A person’s “usual residence” should be consistent with, and evidenced by, their tax records (e.g., tax returns, W-2 forms).”
However, while that rubric may work for many people, it will fail for many others. Tax documents require a current mailing address, not a current residential address. People may, for example, file taxes using a post office box, their tax preparer’s address, or an address different from their usual address. They may also move, so address information on their W-2 may be out-of-date.
A rural resident, for example, may be more likely to use a post office box rather than their physical home address for tax purposes. A college student may file taxes using the address of a parent or guardian, but (according to the proposed rule) should be counted at their “separate usual residence.” Similarly, “snowbirds” may be at their winter residence in January and February, but at their usual residence (the long-term residence where they file taxes) by April 1.
These complexities of tax filing create internal inconsistencies within the proposed rules. Will a person’s usual residence be accepted as the one they report, or will it be one selected by an algorithm based on tax records? Will individual census responses be tossed out if their response differs from their W-2? (Notably, military servicemembers’ W-2s reflect their duty station rather than residential address.) Will hundreds of people be assigned as “residents” of their accountant’s office? What happens to the substantial proportion of the U.S. public that simply does not appear in tax records?
The U.S. will no longer have data on race and ethnicity.
Although race, age, and sex have been asked of every person in every U.S. census since 1790, the proposed rule breaks over two centuries of tradition and proposes to prohibit including race and ethnicity questions in the decennial census. While this proposal purports to prohibit race and ethnicity questions only from the “decennial census short-form questionnaire or any questionnaire used for the enumeration of the population,” those decennial census counts form the basis of every other survey in the U.S. In essence, removing race and ethnicity data from the census means that the U.S. would no longer have any reliable race/ethnicity data—whether at the state, federal or local level, whether private or public.
While excuses for this prohibition are provided, none are plausible. The text suggests, for example, that “excluding such questions from the decennial census in this manner would reduce response burden as well as the risk of disclosure,” but response burden to these questions is minimal and disclosure is a self-inflicted injury that could have been easily avoided and is just as easily rectified. In June 2026 the Department of Commerce issued a sweeping prohibition against use of any modern privacy protections that have previously been applied to protect race and ethnicity. In essence the Department of Commerce wrote a rule that they now are using as a justification for the necessity of this additional proposed rule. To top it all off, neither of these rule changes have gone through the rigorous process the Census Bureau applies on a regular basis to even minor updates.
Moreover, the spurious and pretextual arguments ignore the larger reason why race has been asked in some way in every decennial census. Despite the authors dismissively referring to race and ethnicity as “immaterial personal characteristics,” race and ethnicity data are essential for understanding public health, measuring progress in undoing historical patterns of discrimination, conducting market research, bolstering workforce development, and countless other critical purposes. Without decennial census race and ethnicity data, the weighting of other surveys, public and private, would degrade materially, unnecessarily blinkering all sectors of society from being able to evaluate and assess conditions and outcomes.
The way to address our society’s needs is to have the tools that allow us to determine where we are and measure progress. Just like picking up a marker and drawing a new path on a map doesn’t change the path of a hurricane, ending measurement does not make discrimination go away—it just hampers our ability to understand and respond to the conditions and challenges faced by real people every day.
Other proposed changes and process issues also raise concerns.
Because the text of the proposed rules for residence criteria and demographic questions is so long, the list we have provided here is illustrative rather than exhaustive. Additional concerns include:
Prohibition against including questions on sexual orientation (which, in the 2020 Census, appeared in a question about household relationship).
Despite a focus on “usual residence,” incarcerated people will be “counted at the facility.”
Includes language that usual residence “should be consistent with, and evidenced by, their tax records” without describing how record linkage errors (false positive and false negative) will be addressed.
Inconsistent with federal law (13 USC §221. Refusal or neglect to answer questions; false answers), the proposed rule makes response voluntary for nearly all questions: “With the exception of questions about biological sex, date of birth, and household relationships, no person shall be obligated to furnish a response to any demographic question as part of the decennial census.”
And last, but not least, the process is being rushed. Despite this being a “significant regulatory action,” the public is being granted just 33 days to review and respond. Moreover, requests for statutorily-required regulatory meetings (referred to as
) were ignored.