Speaking following the confirmation of Howard Lutnick as secretary of commerce in the US senate on Tuesday 18^th February, Howard Fienberg, senior vice-president advocacy at the Insights Association, argued the Census Bureau needed “to quit trying to duplicate and compete with private sector commercial activities”.

Fienberg cited the example of the Census Household Panel, which is a Census Bureau programme to develop its own online research panel, and said that the bureau should “refocus attention back on its core responsibilities, particularly in a tough budget environment”.

However, Fienberg also noted that Lutnick’s responses during his senate confirmation hearings left observers “unclear on his priorities for the Census Bureau at a concerning time where the bureau must leverage limited resources to maintain its core constitutional duties in the decennial census and the American Community Survey”.

The Census Bureau is currently seeking a new director, after Robert Santos resigned earlier this year.

The appointment of Lutnick also comes as a letter signed by 768 individuals and 90 organisations, dated 18th February, warned that the “severe challenges” facing the federal statistical system, including lack of funds, risk “undermining economic decision-making and reducing efficiency in both the public and private sectors”.

On EU and US data agreements, Fienberg said that the secretary of commerce would need to continue support for the Data Privacy Framework and its extensions with Switzerland and the UK.

The framework allows organisations to carry out data transfers to and from Europe while remaining compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation.

“Careful maintenance and defence of US commercial interests will prove essential as activist groups pursue European court cases to undermine or kill the DPF, just like they did for the predecessor agreements,” Fienberg added.

The confirmation of Lutnick follows the US senate confirmation of Russ Vought as director of the Office of Management and Budget on 6^th February.

The Insights Association has said it looked forward to working with Russ Vought on competitive sourcing issues, census funding and federal statistical policy.

“Vought’s leadership on competitive sourcing can help reduce the aggressive federal government competition with the private sector, such as in the Census Household Panel, and create more opportunities for private sector jobs and contracts in the insights industry while bringing greater cost efficiency and effectiveness to the government’s activities,” Fienberg said.

“This will align well with legislation we support: the Freedom from Government Competition Act.”

Fienberg had also said the Insight Association would work with Vought to “bolster the resources for the US Census Bureau’s core constitutional activities – the American Community Survey and the decennial census – which ensure that the insights industry can properly represent the American population in research and decision making in both the public and private sectors”.

He added: “As we pass the midpoint of the decade, the time to ramp up funding for the 2030 Census is now, with the census field tests already looming next year.

“Chronic funding interruptions in the last decade forced the bureau to cancel most of its field tests, including in rural areas and tribal reservations, leading to dramatic cost uncertainty when it came time to roll out the full headcount of our population.”

In addition Fienberg had asked that Vought “bring order and clarity to the fluctuation of websites and data available from the Census Bureau” and that “other Trump Administration policies do not impede public access to essential ACS and census data necessary for producing representative statistical samples for all research studies across the US”.

Modernising federal statistical policy by fixing current policies that discourage online research and making it challenging to incentivise response from research subjects could also be considered, Fienberg concluded.