For Immediate Release:
December 18, 2020
CASA, Make the Road New York, and New York Immigration Coalition respond to Supreme Court decision in New York Immigration Coalition v. Trump
Washington, D.C. — Major groups pledge to protect the immigrant community after the Supreme Court delays for another day the question of whether they can be excluded from the Census. In a 6-3 opinion in New York Immigration Coalition v. Trump the Court stated the case is not yet “ripe” for review because implementation has not begun.
Gustavo Torres, Executive Director of CASA, said, “President Trump’s census order is anti-immigrant and unconstitutional, and CASA is disappointed the Supreme Court decided to dismiss the case on technical grounds rather than affirming the right of our communities to be counted. Our year-long Census campaign helped so many immigrant families complete the census. President-Elect Biden must ensure our communities are counted and valued.”
Theo Oshiro, Deputy Director of Make the Road New York, said “We strongly disagree with the Court’s decision today, but stand ready to head right back to court to challenge any further effort to erase our people. During oral arguments, the members of the Court made clear that Trump’s reapportionment scheme was plainly unconstitutional, so we are confident that any further attempt to implement it will fail in the courts.”
Murad Awawdeh and Rovika Rajkishun, Interim Co-Executive Directors of the New York Immigration Coalition, said, “The Supreme Court’s ruling today changes nothing in our battle to defend the personhood of our communities. Should the Trump administration see this as an invitation to exclude our immigrant communities from the constitutionally mandated 2020 Census count of every ‘person’ in America, we will sue them in court, again. We refuse to let this White House deny our very personhood or cruelly withhold from New Yorkers the resources due to them that we need to rebuild in the wake of a global pandemic and economic recession.”
Oral arguments were brought on November 30, 2020.
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