The Trump administration is scaling back plans for this year’s field test of the 2030 census, raising concerns about the Census Bureau’s ability to produce a reliable population tally for redistributing political representation and federal funding in the next decade.
The 2026 test was designed to help the bureau improve the accuracy of the United States’ upcoming once-a-decade head count. A mix of communities in six states, as well as a national sample of households, was expected to take part in the experiment.
But the agency is now set to reduce the number of test sites to two — Spartanburg, S.C., and Huntsville, Ala. — while adding plans to try replacing temporary census workers with U.S. Postal Service staff, according to a Federal Register notice that was made available for public inspection Monday before its official publication.
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I can see it now. Carriers having to go knock on 50 doors on a Tuesday after a Monday holiday to ask census questions. Yaaaaay