HR-7375-119
Referred to the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and in addition to the Committee on the Judiciary, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned.
Sponsored by Deborah Ross (D-NC)
What it does
This bill would require the Census Bureau, starting with the 2030 decennial census, to count incarcerated people at their last home address before incarceration rather than at the location of the prison or detention facility. It would also require states to use that home address — not the prison location — when drawing congressional district boundaries. Both requirements would apply to people held in correctional facilities and immigration detention centers.
Who benefits
Urban and suburban communities that are the last home addresses of large numbers of incarcerated people, which would gain population count and potentially additional political representation. Racial and ethnic minority communities, which are disproportionately represented among the incarcerated population and are often located in urban areas far from prisons. State legislators in urban districts who may gain constituents under redrawn maps. Advocacy groups that argue current counting methods dilute the political power of communities of color. Rural communities that currently host prisons but whose residents are not the incarcerated population would lose counted population but may argue this produces more accurate representation.
Who is hurt
Rural communities where prisons are physically located, which currently benefit from inflated population counts that can translate into additional state legislative seats, federal funding formulas tied to census population, and local political influence. Local governments near prisons that receive per-capita federal funding based on census counts would potentially lose funding. Prison-hosting counties and municipalities that have built political and economic infrastructure around their census-counted population. States with large rural prison populations relative to their urban populations may see shifts in congressional apportionment. The Census Bureau would face significant administrative and cost burdens in tracking and verifying last-known home addresses for the incarcerated population.
Supporters argue
Supporters argue that counting incarcerated people at prison locations artificially inflates the political representation of rural, predominantly white communities at the direct expense of urban communities of color — a distortion sometimes called "prison gerrymandering." They point to studies showing that some rural state legislative districts would fall below minimum population thresholds without their prison populations, meaning those districts exist only because of incarcerated people who cannot vote and have no connection to the community. They contend that the Equal Protection principle of "one person, one vote" is undermined when people are counted where they are held rather than where they live, work, and maintain community ties.
Opponents argue
Opponents argue that the Census Bureau has counted people at their physical location — where they "usually reside" — for over two centuries, and that prisons are, by definition, where incarcerated people reside during their sentence. They contend that verifying a "last known home address" for every incarcerated person is administratively unreliable, as many individuals were homeless, transient, or from out of state before incarceration, creating a significant risk of undercounting or miscounting. They further argue that local governments hosting prisons bear real costs — infrastructure, services, emergency response — that justify population-based funding and representation, and that Congress lacks clear authority to dictate how states use census data for their own redistricting processes under the Tenth Amendment.
Constitutional context
The Enumeration Clause (Art. I, §2) grants Congress authority to direct the census, and the Commerce Clause and Necessary and Proper Clause (Art. I, §8) support federal regulation of census methodology. However, the Tenth Amendment raises questions about whether Congress can mandate how states use census data for their own redistricting — a function traditionally reserved to the states. The bill's requirement that states adopt a specific residence rule for congressional redistricting may face scrutiny under anti-commandeering principles, though the federal government does have authority to set rules for congressional (as opposed to state legislative) district apportionment.
Checks and balances
Congress would gain authority to define census residence rules and constrain state redistricting methodology for congressional seats; states retain discretion over their own legislative redistricting, and courts would serve as the check through Equal Protection and Tenth Amendment challenges.
Historical precedent
Several states — including California, New York, and Maryland — have enacted their own "prison gerrymandering" laws requiring incarcerated people to be counted at their home addresses for state redistricting purposes, providing some evidence of administrative feasibility at the state level.