Because of logistics, not because of some stinking law

Finally the usurper gave up his effort to insert the citizenship question into the census.

President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he is backing off his effort to include a citizenship question in the 2020 census and is instead issuing an executive order directing departments and agencies to better share data related to the number of citizens and noncitizens in the country.

The news conference came as two federal judges refused to let the Department of Justice withdraw lawyers from a lawsuit over the Trump administration’s plans to put the citizenship question on the 2020 census form.

The administration is currently printing census forms without the question after the Supreme Court ruled late last month that Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who stood alongside Trump during his announcement Thursday, did not provide an adequate reason for why the question was necessary.

Attorney General William Barr, who also appeared with Trump at the new conference, said the Supreme Court’s decision effectively closed off the possibility of successfully litigating the issue without jeopardizing the ability to carry out the census on time.

The situation presented “a logistical impediment, not a legal one,” Barr said.

Lickspittle. He wants us to conclude that Trump wasn’t trying to pull an authoritarian move. He was though, Barr.

Meanwhile, the press conference came at the conclusion of another event that’s drawn considerable attention in recent days, the president’s planned social media summit. Trump hosted several right-wing internet personalities to “share how they have been affected by bias online” as Republicans for months have blasted social media companies for what they see as unfair censorship of their views online.

I watched the live video of Trump addressing the meeting for a few minutes, and was gobsmacked all over again at how frantic his way of talking is. He talks at a rapid clip, so rapid that there is no way for anyone else to get a word in, but what he says is completely incoherent, because he keeps interrupting himself to start a new subject – and when I say “keeps” I mean it’s every few seconds. A few words on this obsession, which suggest this other one so interrupt with a few words on that, which suggest this other one so interrupt with a few words on that, repeat forever. It’s so crazy and disordered and wrong it’s hard to believe. He doesn’t have a mind, he has a bundle of chopped-up clips from Fox News that have been whisked together just long enough to disorganize them but not long enough to make any one coherent talking point. Fox Salad dressed with bullshitpesto.

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