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The Census Bureau director expressed alarm that Americans were not cooperating well enough with the census because they feared governmental intrusiveness.
Director Kenneth Prewitt said Saturday, the official Census Day, that opinion polls showed about 17 percent of Americans express concerns about privacy, up from 10 percent three weeks ago.
He said he worried about a “public backlash.”
The agency said that as of Thursday, 50 percent of all households that had received questionnaires had returned them.
“If we don’t get a flood of responses in the next couple of days,” Prewitt said, “we will have a huge task ahead of us as we go into the community to find non-respondents. “
