Hansi Lo Wang

Recent statements by Census Bureau and Justice Department officials have raised the question of whether the Trump administration plans to diverge from more than two centuries of precedent in how the country's congressional seats and Electoral College votes are divvied up.

Updated Aug. 13 at 6:25 p.m. ET

Starting this month, tens of thousands of Census Bureau workers are knocking on doors across the country to make sure the bureau has a complete list of addresses of where people live in the U.S.

Those addresses determine where the bureau will mail instructions and send the next major deployment of workers in 2020 for the constitutionally mandated head count of every resident, which is conducted by household.

The U.S. Census Bureau revealed plans Friday to remove a question about citizenship from census forms that will be used for the upcoming head counts in American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Asked why the change was made, the Census Bureau said in a written statement: "No citizenship question is to be included on the 2020 Census, this includes the Island Area censuses too."

Editor's note: This story originally identified the 2020 census questionnaires for American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands as Census Bureau forms that include a question about U.S. citizenship status.

Updated at 9:48 p.m. ET

John Gore, the main Justice Department official behind the Trump administration's failed push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, is set to leave the department Friday.

A person familiar with the matter tells NPR Gore plans to spend time with his family while he is "discerning next steps."

With the legal fight to block a citizenship question from the 2020 census behind them, immigrant rights groups and other advocates are now turning toward what they consider an even greater challenge — getting every person living in the U.S. counted.

Days after President Trump announced he's no longer pushing for a citizenship question on the 2020 census, officials in his administration are now facing allegations of covering up the question's origins.

Updated at 6:55 p.m. ET

President Trump announced Thursday he would sign an executive order to obtain data about the U.S. citizenship and noncitizenship status of everyone living in the United States.

In a Rose Garden ceremony, Trump said he would drop efforts to include a citizenship question on the 2020 census. Instead, his executive order will direct all U.S. agencies to provide the Department of Commerce all information they have on U.S. citizenship, noncitizenship and immigration status.

Updated at 7:22 p.m. ET

Two federal judges have rejected the Trump administration's requests to completely swap out its teams of lawyers who have been defending its push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

The move marks a setback for the administration as it prepares to make an expected announcement about its new strategy for getting the question onto forms for the census after the Supreme Court ruled last month to keep it off for now.

Sen. Cory Booker is proposing a preemptive strike against using a citizenship question on the 2020 census in a way that he says could give Republicans a political advantage.

Updated on July 9 at 10:08 p.m. ET

A federal judge in New York has denied a request by the Trump administration to replace its legal team in a lawsuit challenging the addition of a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman called "patently deficient" the Department of Justice's effort to change out the lawyers, who have been working on the case for more than a year.

Furman is allowing two lawyers to withdraw from the lawsuit. One has left the department and the other has left the civil division.