House Dem floats bill to require all residents counted in census

A House Democratic lawmaker introduced legislation Wednesday to ensure all residents of the U.S. -- potentially including illegal immigrants -- would be counted in the 2010 census.

Rep. Joe Baca (D-Calif.) introduced legislation to counter an amendment offered by Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) in the Senate that would seek to exclude illegal immigrants from being counted in the census.

“We must not jeopardize a timely or accurate count because of the whims of some who choose to play politics with this issue," Baca said in a statement. "The Vitter amendment clearly violates the spirit of the Constitution, which mandates a count of all our nations’ residents for apportionment purposes, and would cost our nation millions of dollars during this time of economic duress."

Vitter has accused Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) of wanting to include illegal immigrants in the census, which Vitter has alleged would skew the reapportionment of seats in Congress, which is based on the census, toward Democrats.

The Louisiana senator's amendment would require the census to include a question requiring information on an individual's citizenship or immigration status, while the Baca bill would specifically eliminate any questions to that end.

The California Democrat characterized his bill as the way to most accurately base congressional reapportionment, which Baca said would underrepresent Latinos under the Vitter plan.

"Census data is absolutely necessary for an accurate determination of Congressional representation and Electoral College figures,” Baca said. “My legislation can help to guarantee an accurate count in the upcoming Census, and protect our nation from costly and discriminatory tactics like the Vitter amendment, which risks disenfranchising millions of Latinos from participating and being accurately counted.”