Arnold & Porter won the Financial Times award for Innovative Lawyers in the category of Rule of Law and Access to Justice for pro bono work successfully challenging the United States government's attempt to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census. The Financial Times Innovative Lawyers Awards' methodology ranks the originality, leadership, and impact of a law firm's work.
Arnold & Porter, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the New York Civil Liberties Union secured a groundbreaking victory on behalf of immigration advocacy groups when the Supreme Court ruled on June 27, 2019, that the United States could not add a citizenship question to the 2020 census because its stated reason for adding the question was pretextual. Following the defeat in the high court, the administration subsequently announced that it would print the 2020 censuses without the citizenship question.
This marks the second year in a row the Financial Times has honored Arnold & Porter's pro bono work with the Rule of Law award. Arnold & Porter won last year for its work in a high-profile gerrymandering lawsuit in Pennsylvania that struck down Pennsylvania's congressional districting map as an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander.