Class Action: Consumers Take Issue with American Community Survey and Fines If They Refuse to Participate

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Washington and California residents have filed a proposed class action in which they object to being asked to participate in the American Community Survey, which enquires about certain demographic details more specific than those central to the decennial Census. 

The 22-page lawsuit against U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo and Bureau of the Census Director Robert Santos says that unlike the normal ten-year Census, the yearly American Community Survey asks “detailed and personal” questions regarding a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity, fertility history, marital status and divorce history. Moreover, the survey of about 100 questions asks about private health information and how much in taxes and utility bills a household pays, and even about “how many beds, cars, and washing machines the household has,” the complaint relays. 

The two plaintiffs contest that unlike the 10-year Census, the American Community Survey is posed to a sample of a few million households each year, and those who refuse to answer the questionnaire are “subject to fines of up to $5,000 per question.” The case contends that the federal Census Bureau lacks the statutory and constitutional authority to force the plaintiffs and proposed class members to answer the American Community Survey’s “detailed, intrusive questions.” 

“[The plaintiffs] have in the past and will continue in the future to answer the ten-year Census,” the suit states. “But they oppose the highly detailed and personal information demanded in the American Community Survey and have refused to answer it. As a result, they are subject to monetary fines for doing nothing more than keeping the private details of their lives private.” 

Each plaintiff claims to have been visited by Census Bureau agents and informed that their response to the American Community Survey is required by law. The consumers argue in the complaint that although the defendants claim to have statutory authority to compel citizens to answer the survey, the authorization to “collect” information does not equate to the power to compel the production of information, especially when such information is not required for the ten-year Census. 

“The two statutes … at most give the Defendants the authority to conduct a post-census statistical adjustment to ensure the accuracy of the decennial Census,” the suit argues. “They do not give the Defendants the limitless power to compel Plaintiffs to produce personal information or opinions to Defendants.” 

Similarly, the plaintiffs contest that nothing in the federal code allows for a fine for refusal to answer the American Community Survey to be considered a criminal offense. 

Overall, the lawsuit says that “[n]othing in these statutes gives Defendants the authority to compel Plaintiffs to speak when Plaintiffs invoke their First Amendment right to refrain from speaking by refusing to answer the American Community Survey.”

The lawsuit looks to include all persons whom the United States Department of Commerce and Bureau of the Census requires to answer the American Community Survey but who have refused or will refuse to answer it. 

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