Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/20-366_7647.pdf
Page Number: 13

6 

TRUMP v. NEW YORK 

BREYER, J., dissenting 

to do so to the point that it causes significant harm.  Both 
here  and  in  related  litigation  below,  the  Government  has
said  that  as  of  early  December,  it  was  already  feasible  to
exclude aliens without lawful status housed in ICE deten-
tion centers on census day, a “category [that] is likely in the 
tens of thousands, spread out over multiple States.”  Reply 
Brief  for  United  States  6;  see  also  Brief  for  Appellees
New York  Immigration  Coalition  et al.  15  (citing  a  prior 
Government  estimate  that  doing  so  will  exclude  approxi-
mately  “50,000  ICE  detainees”).  Beyond  these  detainees,
appellees note that the Government has also identified at 
least several million more aliens without lawful status that 
it can “individually identify” and seek to exclude from the 
tabulation.  Id., at 15–16.  We have been told the Bureau is 
“working very hard to try to report on” (and exclude from 
the  apportionment  tabulation)  a  large  number  of  aliens 
without  lawful  status,  including  “almost  200,000  persons
who are subject to final orders of removal,” “700,000 DACA
recipients,” and about “3.2 million non-detained individuals
in removal proceedings.”  Tr. of Oral Arg. 28–29.  All told, 
the  Bureau  already  possesses  the  administrative  records 
necessary to exclude at least four to five million aliens.  Id., 
at 29.  Those figures are certainly large enough to affect ap-
portionment.

Of equal importance, plaintiffs argue that aside from ap-
portionment  itself,  the  exclusion  of  aliens  without  lawful
status  from  the  apportionment  count  will  also  negatively
affect  federal  funding  that  is  based  on  per-State  propor-
tional decennial population totals.  Brief for Appellees New 
York  Immigration  Coalition  et al.  18–19;  see  also  Depart-
ment  of  Commerce  v.  New  York,  588  U. S.  ___,  ___  –  ___ 
(2019) (slip op., at 9–10) (noting that even a small under-
count of noncitizen households can lead those States to “lose 
out  on  federal  funds  that  are  distributed  on  the  basis  of 
state population”).  Indeed, a number of federal statutes re-