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Good evening.

Today, President Trump chose not to defy the Supreme Court.

He backed down on putting a question about citizenship on the 2020 census.

The court, you'll recall, didn't buy the administration's rationale that this was being

done to protect minorities by allowing better enforcement of the Voting Rights Act, and

that putting a citizenship question on the census was the only way to get accurate data.

This evening in the Rose Garden, the president revealed that argument to be about as credible

as the court did.

Then he did something pretty remarkable.

He actually undercut his own original argument and said there's really no need for census

question at all.

Instead, he directed agencies to gather citizenship data by other means.

And as he typically does when blocked on something, whether it's legislation, executive

action, or golf course he wants to build, he pitched plan B as even better than plan A.

With today's executive order, which eliminates longstanding obstacles to data sharing, we're

aiming to count everyone.

Ultimately, this will allow us to have an even more complete count of citizens than through

asking the single question alone.

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