Demonstrators hold signs outside the U.S. Supreme Court on the day of arguments in the census case U.S. Department of Commerce v. New York . Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi / ALM

The U.S. Department of Justice has now agreed to pay a total of more than $9 million in attorney fees and other costs stemming from lawsuits that successfully stopped the Trump administration's plan to include a citizenship question on the 2020 census.

The DOJ had settled attorney fees and costs in cases in Maryland and New York earlier this year, for a total of $6.65 million. But two recent settlements in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California adds another $2.4 million to the federal government's final tab, according to copies of the agreements provided by the Justice Department.

Federal law allows parties in civil lawsuits, under certain circumstances, to recoup their costs from the U.S. government. The California settlements are the final ones in the census litigation against the Trump administration, a Justice Department spokeswoman confirmed.

In one attorney fees settlement in the Northern District reached earlier this month, the DOJ agreed to pay roughly $980,000 to three different plaintiffs. Attorneys in the California state attorney general's office received about $845,000 of that amount for attorney fees and other costs, while the Los Angeles Unified School District got about $123,000.

The city of Oakland received more than $14,000 of that settlement, all for attorney fees. Attorneys from Holland & Knight were also involved in that case, representing Los Angeles County, but did not file for attorney fees.

In a settlement also finalized in Northern California district court last week, the Justice Department agreed to pay attorneys for the city of San Jose and the Black Alliance for Just Immigration more than $1.45 million. About $51,000 of that settlement is for taxable costs, while $1.4 million was granted for attorney fees and litigation expenses.

Both plaintiffs in that case were represented by attorneys at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, as well as lawyers for the city of San Jose, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and the pro bono firm Public Counsel.

John Libby, the head of Manatt's investigations and white-collar defense practice, said his firm will recoup about $400,000 in expenses from the settlement, and then donate the remaining funds to the pro bono co-counsel at Public Counsel and the Lawyers' Committee.

"It's unfortunate the government is going to have to pay out that amount of money, but at the same time it's necessary to enforce the law and reverse arbitrary and capricious decisions," Libby said.

The census citizenship question was challenged in several different district court cases. The legal fights culminated in a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June that found the question could not be added under the rationale given by the Commerce Department, which administers the decennial survey.

President Donald Trump initially said after the justices' ruling that he still wanted to include the question on the 2020 survey, clashing with prior statements from the DOJ. But after district court judges blocked the department's efforts to change the legal teams handling the litigation, Trump announced that his administration would look to gather citizenship data through other means.

The Department of Justice settled costs over census litigation in Maryland in September, awarding $2.5 million to Covington & Burling attorneys and another $1.45 million to immigration groups.

Government lawyers reached a similar settlement in New York in early August, agreeing to pay $2.7 million to the ACLU and Arnold & Porter, according to a copy of the agreement first obtained by BuzzFeed News.

However, the legal fight in New York is still ongoing, as the ACLU, the New York Civil Liberties Union and the Arnold & Porter attorneys are asking a federal judge to sanction the Department of Justice. They allege that at least two witnesses from the federal government either withheld documents or gave misleading testimony over the citizenship question.

In a court filing Nov. 15, the attorneys argued that a memo recently released by the House Oversight Committee showed that the late GOP redistricting strategist Thomas Hofeller was involved in the question's orchestration, conflicting with the government testimony.

"Defendants have had countless opportunities to be straight with plaintiffs and this court," the filing reads. "Instead, they have repeatedly misled and have never provided a complete record."

Read more:

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