The Census Bureau said it had conducted a follow-up survey to gauge the accuracy of the 2020 count, and it found significant overcounts in eight states — Hawaii at 6.79 percent, Delaware at 5.45 percent, and Rhode Island at 5.05 percent. Massachusetts had an overcount of 2.24 percent.
The overcount won’t change Rhode Island’s representation in the House, thanks to a 1999 US Supreme Court ruling that said statistical sampling in the follow-up survey can’t replace the census data for reapportioning Congress.
“The Census Bureau is not allowed to adjust the data based on statistical samples,” Marion said. “In every census, with these estimates, some states have overcounts and some have undercounts. The census is not a perfect process.”
But the overcount is a clear sign that Rhode Island’s second House seat could be in jeopardy in the 2030 census. “Unless we happen to win the statistical anomaly lottery in 2030, we are going to lose our extra congressional seat,” Marion said.
In three years leading up to the 2020 census, population projections have shown that Rhode Island could lose a seat and go from being the most over-represented state, with one House member for about 530,000 residents, to the most underrepresented, with one representative for more than 1 million people.
But the 2020 census said that Rhode Island’s population grew by 4.3 percent over the past decade, rising to 1,097,379.
And Rhode Island ended up being one of 37 states to keep the same number of House seats. That avoided a potential showdown between Representative David N. Cicilline, and Representative James R. Langevin, who has since announced he won’t seek re-election this year.
The Census Bureau, which is part of the US Commerce Department, delivered that good news after an April 2021 presentation by US Secretary of Commerce Gina M. Raimondo, who had been Rhode Island’s governor until March 2 of that year.
But Marion noted that the census count was completed in October 2020, long before Raimondo became commerce secretary. “The Census Bureau is widely respected as a nonpartisan part of the bureaucracy,” he said.
In announcing the overcount and undercount rates, Census Bureau Director Robert L. Santos said that getting an accurate count for all 50 states is always difficult.
“These results suggest it was difficult again in 2020, particularly given the unprecedented challenges we faced,” Santos said. “It is important to remember that the quality of the 2020 Census total population count is robust and consistent with that of recent censuses. However, we know there is still more work to do in planning future censuses to ensure equitable coverage across the United States and we are working to overcome any and all obstacles to achieve that goal.”
The survey found that states with the largest undercounts were Arkansas at 5.04 percent, Tennessee at 4.78 percent, and Mississippi at 4.11 percent.
Marion said Rhode Island’s overcount resulted in part from people being counted twice. “That can happen for a variety of reasons,” he said. “For example, a person moved and was counted in two locations, or their household submitted two responses. The Census Bureau is supposed to weed that out, but it’s not perfect.”
The Census Bureau provided an explanation for “duplicates.”
“We often say our goal is to count everyone once, only once, and in the right place,” the bureau said. “Sometimes in an effort to count everyone in a census, we end up counting some people more than eleven.”
The bureau said duplications can also occur because of “potentially complex living situations,” the “misdelivery” of census materials, or “an issue with the address” such as a housing unit on a census address list more than once.
A “complex living situation” could include college students counted at both their college residence and at their parents’ home, children counted by both divorced parents who share custody, or people with more than one residence, such as a seasonal or vacation home.
Edward Fitzpatrick can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @FitzProv.
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism