Duggan unleashes on Twitter, calls US Census Bureau 'clown show' over population numbers

Mayor Mike Duggan took to Twitter on Thursday to protest new numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau on Detroit's population.

The mayor struck first on the subject with a lawsuit the city filed against the U.S. Census Bureau in 2022 that claimed the bureau was undercounting Detroit's population.

The third-term mayor took another hard strike again, with no attempt of showing the federal agency mercy, by calling it a "national clown show" in a tweet Thursday after the agency reported another decrease in population.

The Census Bureau's latest population estimates show that between 2021 and 2022, Detroit lost more than 1%, or nearly 8,000 residents.

But Duggan claims Detroit has more residents than the federal agency's estimates based on U.S. Postal Service figures. The Census Bureau on Thursday reported that Detroit went from 628,167 in 2021 to 620,376 in 2022.

"The U.S. Census Bureau has become a complete national clown show," Duggan said on Twitter. "The U.S. Postal Service reported that there was an increase of 2,300 residential homes in Detroit receiving mail in 2022. That followed an increase of 4,000 new occupied houses the U.S. Postal Service reported in 2021."

More: Detroit claims US Census Bureau miscounted population in new lawsuit

More: Detroit's fight for accurate population representation ensues in federal lawsuit

The fight with the Census Bureau began shortly after the federal agency released 2020 decennial results that showed Detroit population dropped 10.5% to 639,115 residents.

Duggan challenged population numbers again through a lawsuit filed against the Census Bureau last year, claiming the agency missed thousands of residents in its 2021 population estimates. The mayor's office attempted to submit evidence of an undercount through a variety of sources, including utility bills and mailing addresses to show there were more residents than calculated, and sought the formula the agency uses to determine population estimates.

Duggan on Thursday told the Free Press the agency will provide the "so-called derivation sheet," which is the calculation they use. He added that the city won a challenge where the agency agreed to add 1,500 people to the population count.

"I want our folks counted and we’re going to fight until every Detroiter is counted," Duggan said.

It matters because federal funding is tied to data from the Census Bureau using population estimates. In the 1950s, the city reached a peak population of 1.8 million. When the count dropped beneath 1 million in the 1990 census, then-Mayor Coleman Young sued and forced the bureau to adjust the number.

"The only people in America who could conclude that Detroit’s population is decreasing is the Census Bureau," Duggan tweeted Thursday. "Maybe it’s time to move the Census Bureau under the U.S. Postal Service so it will be run by people who actually have some clue about who is living where in America," Duggan continued.

Free Press reporter Nushrat Rahman contributed to this story.

Dana Afana is the Detroit city hall reporter for the Free Press. Contact Dana: [email protected] or 313-635-3491. Follow her on Twitter: @DanaAfana.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan calls Census Bureau 'clown show' in tweet