Bill Seeks To Include LGBT Questions On U.S. Census

A federal bill announced Tuesday seeks to include LGBT questions on major surveys conducted by the government.

The Census Equality Act was introduced by Democratic Senators Kamala Harris of California and Tom Carper of Delaware.

Their bill seeks to add questions allowing Americans to identify their sexual orientation and gender identity on the U.S. Census, which takes place once every 10 years, and the annual American Community Survey.

The Trump administration last year said that neither survey would include such questions.

In a statement, Harris said that the legislation is needed because “the spirit of the Census is that no one should go uncounted and no one should be invisible.”

She asserted that the information could provide “better tools to enforce civil rights protections for a community that is too often discriminated against.”

The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and the National LGBTQ Task Force have endorsed the bill.