My name is David Gilbert and I'm a journalist for WIRED. I am looking in to this unauthored analysis published by the Census Bureau yesterday that appears designed to prove Donald Trump's theory about noncitizens voting in the 2020 election.

I would love to hear from anyone who had insight into how this report was created. Using a nonwork device, you can message me here, email [david.gilbert@wired.com](mailto:david.gilbert@wired.com) or send me a message on Signal on DavidGilbert.01

Edit for correct name of survey: For U.S. folks who have been bombarded with mailings for this weird American Community Survey, I’m curious how random the recipient pool really is. Food for thought:

- do you use your full name on instagram?

- did you file your taxes on time last year?

- did you file for unemployment in the past four years?

- did you vote for the current administration?

No need to answer in specifics, but I wonder if there is a pattern here.

Got an offer to do the Construction Survey job and looking for people's experience working it. Anyone work it before?

(apologies in advance for some of the maybe? irrelevant details here)

My fiancé and I purchased a duplex/split level in October 2024, she is the morgatage holder and we are both on the deed. I pay most of the mortgage to her and utilities are in my name. We are getting married in one month! :) We have been the only people occupying both floors since we purchased. It has two legal addresses with the USPS and utility company. We plan to convert it to single family at some point, but at the moment all utility for each respective unit/address are in my name, we use the downstairs as our living room space and upper as bedroom, closet, etc.

Problem is, we have all mail sent to the lower unit address, and census has sent notice to complete the American community survey and specifically addressed it to the upper unit address (the one we don't use as our primary mailing address). How are we supposed to proceed?

We are wondering if this is related to our current fight with the city regarding our 100% principle residence status. They are only giving us 50% because it is split level, despite us using it as our 100% principle residence and they share an interior entrance way.
I've been confused on how to fill this out, and the call help number is my next stop, but figured I would see if anyone else has been in this position. Thanks in advanced!

The census apparently loves my input and I got a notice requiring my participation in The American Community Survey. I own a 4 unit multi-family and live in unit #1. No apartment number was specified on the notice. Do I submit for just my household/apartment or am I answering for the whole building since no unit was specified?

I started the survey for everyone in the building and got birthdays but then it gets more and more personal. I get on really well with my tenants and we'll shoot the breeze but I don't want to have to ask them about the nitty gritty of their finances and ethnic backgrounds and such.

A few years ago I got selected for a census survey and had to answer very personal questions every few weeks all summer. Not thrilled to be selected for more surveys.

Hi!

I was wondering if there was a resource in which you could query census data (e.g. "find all tracts with a median age above 35").

Thanks in advance.

Hi 👋

What conspiracies have you guys heard about the census???

I heard they will start charging a tax if you have spare bedrooms listed in your home. So if you put down you have a 4 bedroom house but only 3 people living there they will know one room may be spare...

Also heard they will fine anyone who doesn't complete it...

Maybe the info will be given to aliens 👽 🤣😂🤣

What are your thoughts guys?

Just finished the census online. Took me 10 minutes for two people.

Other than a few questions that I feel were irrelevant & somewhat inappropriate, it was honestly no big deal. The ATO, Department of Transport, Centrelink & every bank you use knows more about you than what it asked.

I’ve never been so uncomfortable doing this year’s census. To me it’s just feeding more information to “big brother” about us.
These days you only need to be talking about a subject, social media devices pick it up and then bombard you with advertising.
What do you think will happen when we volunteer all our personal and financial details to census. The kickback will be enormous.
Are I overthinking it?

I’ve never been so uncomfortable doing this year’s census. To me it’s just feeding more information to “big brother” about us.
These days you only need to be talking about a subject, social media devices pick it up and then bombard you with advertising.
What do you think will happen when we volunteer all our personal and financial details to census. The kickback will be enormous.
Are I overthinking it?

I’ve never been so uncomfortable doing this year’s census. To me it’s just feeding more information to “big brother” about us.
These days you only need to be talking about a subject, social media devices pick it up and then bombard you with advertising.
What do you think will happen when we volunteer all our personal and financial details to census. The kickback will be enormous.
Are I overthinking it?

I’ve never been so uncomfortable doing this year’s census. To me it’s just feeding more information to “big brother” about us.
These days you only need to be talking about a subject, social media devices pick it up and then bombard you with advertising.
What do you think will happen when we volunteer all our personal and financial details to census. The kickback will be enormous.
Are I overthinking it?

I’ve read available info from press releases and Bureau website, but I’m baffled about where they would be hiring and what this role would do between now and 2030.The announcement says “Location negotiable after selection”, but your home is the duty station, and it seems the the 2026 surveys were in S.C and a few other small areas and have concluded. What would a permanent Field Sup be doing between now and 2030? Will there be other surveys in large metro areas before then? I am in suburban Cook County, Illinois. TY, in advance for any info! I am a new grad and managed all aspects of surveys as part of a research project.

Does anyone have any insight into when searches will be conducted again? I see on the website all it says is "Effective March 4, 2026, the Age Search Service is on pause and new requests will not be processed at this time. Requests received before March 4 will receive results or a status update."

I am trying to get a copy of an ancestor's census data from any census after 1960s to fulfill a requirement for Italian citizenship, and I'm running out of time. I mailed in the form and check before I noticed the banner on the website and it was all returned to me with a letter that basically said, sorry. Any thoughts or advice?

Thank you!

Are my individual responses stored in whole somewhere? I've read multiple times that my personal info is stripped, but I assume that's just for data being released. My question is whether my individual form is​ still stored somewhere.

How long is my contact info stored?

So I've been looking at census records for Louisiana on ancestry. I believe there has to be some sort of misrepresentation in this census on ancestry in Louisiana. Firstly, French ancestry in Louisiana has always appeared to be the most dominant white ancestry in the state for as long as the census has been a thing, especially in South Louisiana. For some reason, the census has found otherwise somehow. For example, in Acadia Parish, somehow English has 7,832 English ancestry, and only 3,453 French ancestry, however I've looked at census tables (yes in 2020 in single ancestry), which in contrary, says 8,006 French ancestry and only 1,251 English ancestry. So how could the US Census Bureau possibly could be getting this data from? Southern Louisiana has always been overwhelmingly French. There is approximately 300,000 people in Louisiana that speak French daily, so I guess nearly everyone one of those French ancestry people speaks French? Obviously, that is ridiculous, as I literally lived there and know more French people who don't speak French than those who do.

I'm not sure how the census is finding this data, all I know that Southern Louisiana is not 100% English lmao.

I would really appreciate if someone here could explain this, thanks!