This is a disturbing headline to an even more disturbing action.

It’s from the New York Times. It reads.

“

With the Trump administration’s decision to end the 2020 census count four weeks early, the Census Bureau now has to accomplish what officials have said it cannot do: accurately count the nation’s hardest-to-reach residents — nearly four of every 10 households — in just six weeks.

The result is both a logistical challenge of enormous proportions that must take place in the middle of a pandemic, and yet another political crisis for the census, historically a nonpartisan enterprise. The announcement, which came Monday evening, immediately generated sharp criticism.

On Tuesday, four former directors of the Census Bureau issued a statement warning that an earlier deadline would “result in seriously incomplete enumerations in many areas across our country,” and urged the administration to restore the lost weeks.”

Participating in the census helps funding for public education and other social services that directly affect our public school students. From the actual US government census website:

Ending it early with this many people not accounted for could be catastrophic for public schools and programs that support public school students.

And it’s deliberate.

During a pandemic.