It has been a little more than two weeks since the 2024 elections in which President-Elect Trump won re-election, and the Republicans secured a majority in the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives. These dramatic changes will usher a wide range of policy and operational changes across the Federal government, including the U.S. Census Bureau. Some details are starting to emerge.
Leadership
Secretary of Commerce
On November 19, President-Elect Trump announced his intention to nominate Howard Lutnick to serve as Secretary of the Department of Commerce, the Census Bureau’s parent agency. Mr. Lutnick is Co-Chair of the president’s transition team and CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, an American-based financial services firm. The Commerce Secretary nomination requires confirmation by the U.S. Senate. The Senate Commerce, Science, Transportation Committee, which has oversight of the Commerce Department, is expected to schedule a confirmation hearing after the 119th Congress convenes in January 2025.
Census Bureau Director
The current Director of the U.S. Census Robert Santos was sworn into his position on January 5, 2022. Under the terms of the Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act of 2011, which makes the Census Bureau Director eligible to serve two five-year terms, Director Santos is eligible to remain in his position. If the incoming Administration, however, wants to select a new Director, they must inform both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives in writing 60 days prior to his removal.
Budget and Policy Outlook
Budget
As The Census Project has reported, the federal government is currently funded under the terms of a continuing resolution (CR) that expires December 20, 2024. Under the CR, all statistical agencies are essentially flat-funded at their Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 spending levels, including the U.S. Census Bureau.
As of November 21, it was not clear if Congress will reach an agreement on final FY 2025 spending bills before the current CR expires or extend the current CR until mid-March. Some senior members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committee prefer the former to give the new Administration a clean slate. The Speaker of the House, Representative Mike Johnson (R-LA), prefers the latter, but is waiting to hear President-Elect Trump’s views. It is worth noting that during the first Trump Administration, the final FY 2017 appropriations bills were not signed into law until May 2018 and three CRs were required to keep the federal government open.
FY 2026 and beyond
Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 deliberations aside, the FY 2026 appropriations process will commence shortly. Under current law, the President must develop and submit a budget to Congress no later than the first Monday in February prior to the start of the upcoming fiscal year. In practice, the President sometimes fails to meet this submission deadline, particularly during transition years.
In February 2018, the Trump Administration released a “skinny” or stripped-down budget proposal, and its completed budget proposal on March 16, 2018. It is not clear if they will pursue a similar strategy. It is also not clear how the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) could impact the President’s budget request. DOGE is a presidential advisory commission announced by President-Elect Trump that will be led by billionaire businessmen Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. The goals of the commission are largely centered around identifying cuts in federal spending.
The Project 2025 manifesto, which could influence the incoming Administration’s policy agenda, endorses federal funding cuts. With respect to the Census Bureau, it states that “The new Administration must immediately conduct a review to identify ways to better control costs and reverse recent failures of investments intended to upgrade the financial management, information technology, and human resources systems of the Census Bureau.” These align somewhat with concerns raised by a recent report from the Commerce Department’s Inspector General.
The Census Project will be monitoring and reporting on the President’s FY 2026 budget and ensuing congressional appropriations process.
Policy Outlook
Issues regarding Census Bureau operations and policies did not figure prominently during the presidential campaign. However, it is assumed that the incoming Administration will resurrect its interest in related unresolved issues and priorities from the first Trump Administration, especially the addition of a citizenship question on the decennial census. Other policies the incoming Administration may prioritize include: consolidating the Census Bureau, Bureau of Labor Statistics, and Bureau of Economic Analysis; increasing the number of Census Bureau political appointees; and reevaluating the role and composition of existing census advisory committees. In addition, the new Administration may be supportive of legislation that the U.S. House of Representatives passed earlier this year to exclude undocumented immigrants from the apportionment base.
Some Census stakeholders are looking to language in Project 2025 to understand the incoming Administration’s census priorities and interests. To this end, the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights recently released a one pager summarizing census issues in Project 2025.
The Census Project will be tracking and reporting on proposed census policies and issues that emerge from not only the new Administration, but also from the 119th Congress.
