As a CA resident, the census workers did a pretty good job. One asked me about a building at an address while riding around on his bike for ten minutes, I told him it was an address for a pool building. His comment, "I guess nobody lives there."
As you suggested, much of the discrepancy may be due to those who have left the state along with the half-a-million that crossed the border since last July.(Estimates of 12 million illegals in the country are so off as to be a joke. Might have been true ten years ago- I'd put it at 30+ million)
“much of the discrepancy may be due to those who have left the state along with the half-a-million that crossed the border since last July.”
Califormia census takers failed to count the people living in the cemetary’s. Shocking, California should have asked Illinois census takers, they are well trained in cemetary census taking.