'High Risk' of Failure: The 2020 Census

"Congress and now the Trump administration have set the 2020 decennial on a course that threatens its basic accuracy," according to an article by Robert Shapiro, former under secretary of commerce for economic affairs.

An inaccurate Census puts some of the basic functions of the federal government at risk, according to Shapiro. The questionable decisions have been compounding since 2014, "when Congress decreed that the 2020 Decennial Census should cost no more than the 2010 count withoutadjusting for inflation, or some $12.5 billion."

Since the, explains Shapiro, the Trump Administration has "flatlined" funding for the Census Bureau, and the bureau's director, John Thompson, quit. The U.S. Government Accountability Office has declared the 2020 Decennial Census at "High Risk" of failure.

Shapiro describes the potential consequences of the Trump Administration's neglect of the Census Bureau and the 2020 Census—consequences that include cities and states being denied access to funding.