There wont be a citizenship question on the 2020 census , but activists and officials say President Donald Trump s administration may have done lasting damage to the survey nonetheless in deterring immigrants and people of color from participating.

Trump decided last week to allow the census to proceed without a question about whether respondents are U.S. citizens, after the Supreme Court said his administration hadnt properly justified adding the question. The Trump administration claimed it needed the question to better enforce the Voting Rights Act. The Supreme Court said that rationale seemed to be contrived.

But the year-and-a-half-long push by his administration to include a question on citizenship something experts say would give more power to Republicans and white people plus incessant anti-immigration rhetoric coming from the White House has created a toxic mix of fear and confusion for immigrants around the census, advocates say. An inaccurate count would have devastating consequences because the survey is used to allocate hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funds each year and to draw congressional seats.

Now, armed with a significant legal victory from the Supreme Court, organizations focused on getting hard-to-count populations to fill out the survey are figuring out how they can convince immigrant communities to respond to the survey. Individual census responses must be kept confidential, according to federal law, but advocates readily acknowledge that convincing immigrants they should fill out the questionnaire in the current climate will be difficult.

Civil rights groups have said since the beginning of the citizenship question controversy that the Trump administration wanted to use the census to intimidate immigrants and suppress minority political power. Documents from a now-deceased redistricting guru lent support to that claim . The lingering fear and uncertainty could allow the Trump administration to do that, even though a citizenship question wont be on the census.

No doubt damage has been done, said Arturo Vargas, CEO of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund. The kind of debate that was surrounding the whole controversy of whether or not to add a citizenship question, not only did [it] raise awareness that there will be a census next year, but also raised anxiety about whether or not you should participate in the census next year.

A Census Bureau study released earlier this year found very strong concerns about the citizenship question and said distrust in government, privacy and confidentiality concerns, as well as fear answers would be used against people, were major barriers to filling out the survey. When the Census Bureau conducted a full test of the census in Providence County, Rhode Island, last year, the survey didnt include a citizenship question. Nonetheless, some people were afraid to respond to the test out of fear it could jeopardize their immigration status, according to The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times .

While experts are concerned the controversy surrounding the citizenship question will have lingering effects on the count, despite not appearing on the form, the Supreme Courts decision will serve as a starting point for organizations to convince everyone to participate in the census count, said Sarah Brannon, the managing attorney of the American Civil Liberties Unions Voting Rights Project, which represented some of the plaintiffs challenging the question.

We have hope that there is at least now a place to start from and that a lot of work can be done hopefully to diminish that impact, Brannon said.

One way groups think they can get people to respond is by emphasizing the connection between census data and obtaining resources for a community. Some of NALEOs message testing from last year showed emphasizing the benefits of the census was one of the most effective ways to get people to respond, Vargas said.

Advocates and officials will also depend heavily on local and community groups to build trust around the census.