High court rules challenge to Trump census plan is premature

The Supreme Court has dismissed as premature a challenge to President Donald Trump’s plan to exclude people living in the country illegally from the population count used to allot states seats in the House of Representatives

Supreme Court Census (Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

The Supreme Court has dismissed as premature a challenge to President Donald Trump s plan to exclude people living in the country illegally from the population count used to allot states seats in the House of Representatives

But the court’s decision Friday is not a final ruling on the matter and it's not clear whether Trump will receive final numbers from the Census Bureau before he leaves office next month.

The high court said it was too soon to rule on the legality of Trump's plan because it's not yet clear how many people he would seek to exclude and whether the division of House seats would be affected.

The three liberal justices dissented.