On January 27, 2021, Kathleen Styles, an official at the U.S. Census Bureau, announced at a National Conference of State Legislatures event that the bureau would release its final apportionment report by April 30, 2021. Styles also said the bureau hoped to release detailed redistricting data after July 31, 2021.
Census results are used to determine congressional apportionment (i.e., how many seats in the U.S. House of Representatives a state has). Article I, Section 2, of the U.S. Constitution requires that congressional representatives be apportioned to the states on the basis of population. Consequently, a state may gain seats in the U.S. House if its population grows or lose seats if its population decreases, relative to populations in other states. Census data also informs redistricting efforts at both the congressional and state legislative levels.
The bureau originally planned to deliver its final apportionment report by December 31, 2020, and redistricting data by March 31, 2020. The coronavirus pandemic complicated counting efforts, thereby delaying the delivery of this data. It is not yet clear precisely how these delays will affect state-specific redistricting procedures and deadlines.
In other redistricting and reapportionment news, on January 20, 2021, President Joe Biden (D) issued an executive order directing the Secretary of Commerce to include in the final apportionment report the “tabulation of total population by State that reflects the whole number of persons whose usual residence was in each State as of the designated census date in section 141(a) of title 13, United States Code, without regard to immigration status.” This effectively overturned former President Donald Trump’s (R) earlier directive to the contrary.
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