On May 13, by a vote of 32-28, the House Appropriations Committee approved H.R. 8845, its version of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2027 Commerce, Justice, Science (CJS) Appropriations bill, funding the Census Bureau, among other federal agencies.
The bill recommends that the Census Bureau receive $1.49 billion in Fiscal Year 2027, an amount equal to what the agency received in FY 2026. This funding level is approximately $521 million below the Administration’s request, $2.01 billion, and even farther below the funding level of $2.11 billion endorsed by 85 members of The Census Project and 44 bipartisan members of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Prior to the full committee’s consideration of the bill, The Census Project sent a statement to the Committee expressing concern about the bill’s proposed funding level. In addition, the statement addressed Section 579 of the bill, which would preclude the Census Bureau from enforcing the mandatory response requirement of the decennial census and ACS, while also limiting the Bureau to no more than two follow up inquiries across all of its surveys. The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights sent a letter to the Committee expressing concern not only about those concerns, but also Section 553 of the bill, which would exclude “aliens who are unlawfully present in the United States” from the apportionment base.
During the nine-hour markup session, Representative Grace Meng (D-NY), the Ranking Member of the House CJS Appropriations Subcommittee, offered and withdrew an amendment that would have increased funding for the Census Bureau to the Administration’s request. Other members were not given an opportunity to speak in support of the amendment even though several, including Representatives Glenn Ivey (D-MD), Betty McCollum, and Henry Cuellar (D-TX), had expressed an interest in doing so.
In a report accompanying the bill, Representative DeLauro (D-CT), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, stated that “The bill’s funding level for the Census Bureau is very inadequate, especially as the Bureau must ramp up efforts in fiscal year 2027 to prepare for the 2027 Economic Census, the 2030 Decennial Census, and other census surveys. The bill also includes policy riders that would lower the quality of census surveys and implement an unconstitutional change to Census Bureau apportionment count procedures.”
Additional provisions in the report also referenced the Census Bureau:
- “Improving Annual Poverty Data Collection—The Committee recognizes that the cost of collecting data for the Current Population Survey (CPS) to maintain current sample size and quality requirements has increased in recent years. The Committee encourages Census, in coordination with the Bureau of Labor Statistics, to assess the feasibility of combining CPS survey data with other sources of information, such as administrative data and population estimates, to produce estimates on topics of interest. The Committee also recognizes the interest in detailed poverty measures. Within the funds provided, the Committee urges Census to increase the sample size of the March supplement of the CPS. Additionally, the Committee recognizes the work of Census in determining the feasibility of expanding CPS to U.S. territories. The Committee directs Census to review the feasibility of continued expansion and provide a briefing providing an update on these efforts no later than 120 days after the enactment of this Act.”
- “Census Digital Modernization—The Committee supports Census in its efforts to modernize digital services ahead of the 2030 Decennial Census to ensure accurate, efficient, and secure responses from every U.S. household. The Committee urges Census to continue leveraging proven, secure, and scalable digital platforms and tools that successfully supported prior decennial operations, and to adopt modern content management, forms processing, analytics, and customer-experience technologies that strengthen reliability, accessibility, and public trust of decennial operations.”
- “Data Analysis and Verification Phase—The Committee encourages Census to incorporate a Data Analysis and Verification Phase early in the decennial census planning process. In carrying out these activities, the Committee encourages Census to leverage advanced analytics capabilities and proven data-verification tools, including those developed and deployed by experienced public and private sector partners that have previously supported large-scale data analysis and validation efforts. The Committee believes that incorporating these capabilities during early decennial census planning will improve accuracy, enhance operational efficiency, and ultimately reduce costs to taxpayers while delivering a more reliable decennial census.”
- “Decennial Outreach Campaign—The Committee directs Census to submit a report, within 180 days of the enactment of this Act, on the planned outreach campaign for the upcoming decennial census and its role in ensuring an accurate 2030 Census. The report should address how the outreach campaign will address the net coverage errors that occurred in the 2020 Census.”
House Republican leaders plan to debate many of the fiscal 2027 funding bills on the floor this spring and summer, although it not clear when the CJS appropriations bill will be considered by the full House of Representatives.
The Senate Appropriations Committee plans to mark up its version of the FY 2027 CJS Appropriations bill on June 4.
