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New York state attorney general Letitia James is leading a coalition of states, cities and counties suing the Trump administration over its attempt to leave undocumented migrants out of the census, the basis for the apportionment of seats in the US House of Representatives.

Sam Levine’s report on that attempt follows at the bottom of this block and here’s an excerpt from it:

Republicans in recent years have been pushing to exclude non-citizens and other people ineligible to vote from the tally used to draw electoral districts. In 2015, Thomas Hofeller, a top Republican redistricting expert, explicitly wrote that such a change “would be advantageous to Republicans and non-Hispanic whites”.

James, meanwhile, said on Friday afternoon: “President Trump’s proclamation is the latest in a long list of anti-immigrant actions and statements he has made since the beginning of his first campaign.

“It’s another election-year tactic to fire up his base by dehumanizing immigrants and using them as scapegoats for his failures as a leader.

“No one ceases to be a person because they lack documentation, which is why we filed this lawsuit. Instead of fearmongering, now is the time to be engaging in a robust education and outreach campaign to ensure each person in this country is counted. We beat the president before in court, and we will beat him again.”

According to James’s statement, the suit has been “filed against President Trump, the US Department of Commerce, the US Census Bureau, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and Census Director Steven Dillingham”.

The attorneys general of Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, and the District of Columbia have signed on.

So have the cities of Central Falls, Rhode Island; Chicago; Columbus; New York; Philadelphia; Phoenix; Pittsburgh; Providence; Seattle; the city and county of San Francisco; and Cameron, El Paso, and Hidalgo counties in Texas and Monterey county in California.