and here in new york, we are joined by ari berman, a senior writer at mother jones, a reporting fellow at the nation institute, and author of "give us the ballot: the modern struggle for voting rights in america." are you -- ari, you attended the supreme court oral arguments yesterday. set the scene for us. were you surprised by the tenor of the question? >> i did. this is one of the most important cases for democracy and decades, amy, because the senses determined so many things in our society, how $880 billion in federal funding is allocated, how voting districts are drawn, how many houses, electoral college votes. there is nothing we do that is more important democracy than the senses. this one question about u.s. citizenship has a possibility to derail the entire census. one of the most imimportant and longest coconstitutional responsibilities our government has could now be deraililed and tuturn into a popolitical weapoy the e trump administration to target immigrants anand places were l lots of immigrants live. i was hoping i would hear these big picture debates in the supreme co

ari berman wrote that the legal career has been a decades long crusade as a reason to twist the census to donald trump's anti-immigration aims is interesting. if the supreme court allowed them to remain, little question that the voting rights of many americans will be undermined. two people at the oral arguments today. director of the aclu's voting rights project who voted against arguing in front of the supreme court today. president and ceo of the leadership conference on civil and human rights and former head of the department of justice's civil rights division. how surprising was it to hear john roberts voice the idea that the reason to add the question was to strengthen the voting rights act? >> not all that surprising. the government has been saying that's the reason why they added this question. as you noted, they were intent on adding it long before anyone suggested the idea that it might be helpful for purposes of a voting rights act. the voting rights act is not a priority of this administration. they hadn't brought a single lawsuit to enforce the voting rights act. the notio

joining me now is political reporter mark caputo and mother jones senior reporter ari berman.art with you from the on-the-ground reporting perspective in florida. just run us through exactly how this came to be. this was something the voters down there decided they wanted and how it may play out in the legislature going forward. is this going to become law? >> i think the chances of it becoming law are pretty high. it is a republican-controlled legislature and why we don't have a clear analysis of the party registration and leanings of former felons or returning citizens as they call them, there are pretty strong indications in part if you look at the racial composition and you note african-americans and hispanics tend to vote for democratic, chances pr that more returning citizens happen to be democratic voters than republican voters. republican lecture sees this, sees that florida has razor-thin election margins, with year after year, election after election, so there's an incentive for the goch to make sure that fewer of these folks get on the voter rolls. now that having b

this is journalist ari berman speaking with democracy now! last election day. thehe census is basically dna of our democracy. it determinene so many things tt we do from how b of dollars of federal funding is distributed to how political districts are drawn, to how many electoral votes states get. if the census is rigged, than all of american democracy will be rigged as well. amy: the supreme court also said monday it will take up three cases that will determine whether lgbtq people will be covered by title 7 of the civil rights act, which bars employers from discriminating against employees on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin, and religion. the trump administration will argue that the act was not intended to provide protection to gay or transgender workers. justices will hear arguments in the case in the fall, with a decision likely by june of 2020. in the meantime, lgbtq activists are calling on congress to pass the equality act, which would amend civil rights laws to explicitly protect lgbtq people against discrimination. authorities at the uni