Latinos in the United States

SIGNIFICANCE: The large and growing Latino population significant impacted the United States both culturally and economically. Although linked by language, Latinos are a diverse group consisting of many different races and origins. 

The Latino populationalso referred to as the Hispanic American sector of United States societycontinued to increase in proportion to the total population with each succeeding decade. The US Census Bureau defined "Hispanic or Latino" as a person of any race whose cultural background or place of origin is a Spanish-speaking countryprimarily those of Latin America. Other sources define the term to include people from a BrazilianPortuguese-speakingbackground, and some people make distinctions between the terms "Hispanic" and "Latino."

The methods the census used to define and count Hispanic identity changed over time. Beginning in 2020, for example, the Census Bureau started counting people as Hispanic who did not check the Hispanic box on the census form but did answer the subsequent question about race in a way that implied a Hispanic background. This change led to moderate increases in the numbers of Latino populations in the US.  

In 2022, the US Census Bureau estimated 63.7 million19.1 percentof residents of the United States were Hispanic or Latino. About 60 percent of those were of Mexican origin. Included in those numbers were recent immigrants, those who legally or illegally arrived from Latin American nations, and US citizens whose families have been residents of the United States for many generations. The combination of this group’s high birthrate coupled with the constant influx of immigrants into the United States led to the prediction that by the year 2060 the Latino population will exceed 111 million people, representing 28 percent of the total US population. 

Nationalism

The Latino population described above is far from a homogeneous cultural group. Its members can be characterized better by their diversity than by their similarity. Strong nationalistic identification with their countries or regions of origin served to distinguish Mexican Americans from Cuban Americans Puerto Ricans—and a host of other nationals—and militated against their acting in concert politically, economically, or socially. For example, the large Cuban American colony in greater Miami, Florida, tended to be highly conservative politically, while the Puerto Ricans of New York state and the Mexican Americans of California generally were democratic or liberal in political alignment. 

Race and Ethnicity

Members of the Latino community ran the gamut of virtually every racial and ethnic group found in the world. The initial voyages of exploration and discovery of the Western Hemisphere by Europeans from Spain, England, Portugal, France, and the Netherlands quickly led to a racial amalgamation of these primarily White people with the bronze-skinned Indigenous peoples. This mixture of races resulted in what came to be referred to in Spanish America as mestizos. This group would become the predominant racial entity throughout much of Central and South America, as well as what is the present day US Southwest. 

When the European settlers in Mexico, Central America, and South America found they could not successfully exploit the Indigenous peoples in mining and agriculture, they turned to the importation of Africans. They initially used Africans as indentured servants but ultimately used them as enslaved people. England, France, Portugal, Spain, and the Netherlands entered into an extensive and lucrative transshipment of Africans to the Western Hemisphere, where they were sold as labor for the mining of precious metals and the manufacture of sugar, cotton, rice, and a wide variety of other marketable crops. 

Enslavers bred their human chattels with other enslaved persons as part of the existing economic system, and soon Black people—later typed as mulattoes, quadroons, octoroons, and other racial mixtures—became part of a gene pool already containing a mixture of White and American Indian strains. In the course of the centuries that followed, Asians joined the heterogeneous racial population that spread throughout the Western Hemisphere. Chinese people settled in substantial numbers along the borders of Mexico’s northernmost states. Faced with persecution by warring factions during Mexico’s Revolution of 1910, they migrated to the United States in large numbers. 

Religion

When Europeans landed in what became Mexico in the sixteenth century, they encountered a highly civilized society more advanced than that of Europe at the time. Spaniards, however, did not perceive or value the cultural sophistication of the newly discovered civilization. They considered it their responsibility to replace what they perceived as a heretic religionin which the Aztec emperor was revered as a demigodwith Catholicism. The Europeans adopted a program of ruthless destruction of what they considered idolatry. Similarly, in other parts of the continent, Portuguese, French, and English forced their own brands of Christianity on the indigenous populations they conquered and exploited. In the initial four centuries following the opening of the hemisphere, Catholicism and Protestantism became the dominant religions throughout North, Central, and South America. By 2022, though Catholicism remained the largest religious group among Latinos in the United States, the number of Latinos identifying as Catholic had decreased significantly. In 2010, nearly 70 percent of Latino adults identified as Catholic, according to the Pew Research Center. A decade later, that number had fallen to 43 percent. 

Some Indigenous peoples attempted to retain their identification with their old gods. This often took the form of hiding their ancient sacred images behind the altars of European places of worship. Today, Indigenous and European religions are often practiced side by side, venerating gods and saints together, although by different names, as can be seen in contemporary Guatemala. 

Enslaved people from Africa, seized and transported from their lands to the Western Hemisphere, often brought their religions with them. This offered a source of comfort and hope under harsh conditions. These African religions, sometimes modified by exposure to Christian sects, have open, active communicants in countries such as Haiti, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Brazil. Immigrants to the United States from those nations often bring these ancestral religious practices with them. Such religious societies play an active role in the daily lives of their followers in the United States. 

Language

Most second- and third-generation Latinos in the United States had good command of the English language. Newcomers, however—like most immigrants from nations who speak languages other than English—often lack basic English-language skills, severely limiting their ability to progress economically, politically, and socially. In a few areas, there were neighborhoods large and insular enough in their organization, and where Spanish iwas so widely spoken among commercial establishments, that English language skills were unnecessary to carry out daily activities. Opportunities existed in most areas, however, for newcomers to acquire the basic English skills necessary to move into the mainstream US culture. Research showed the percentage of Latinos in the US who speoke proficient English was increasing. In 2022, nearly three-quarters of the Latino population over five years old in the US spoke English proficiently. 

Nevertheless, some immigrants from isolated communities in Latin America, often still committed to tribal mores and language, found it difficult to blend into the larger culture. Some did not even speak the widespread Spanish language, but depended on native dialects such as Mayan, Quechua, or Nahuatl for communication. Lacking skills in either the English or Spanish languages, quite often these small groups were subjected to exploitation by unscrupulous business interests and were often forced to work for miserably low wages. They were also threatened with being turned in to US immigration authorities if they sought redress under the law. 

Mexico

Mexico led all other nations in the number of foreign-born living in the United States, though the quantity of new Mexican immigrants arriving to the US each year slowed during the 2010s and early 2020s. With a population of over 125 million, Mexico could not provide enough jobs for those entering its workforce every year. This pool of surplus labor, combined with the availability of unskilled or entry-level jobs in the United States, accounted for Mexico’s historically high immigrant influx. There were an estimated 37.4 million people of Mexican origin in the US in 2022. 

Included in this wave of new arrivals were members of Mexico’s Indigenous communities, who spoke a variety of tribal tongues as their primary language. Primarily from rural areas with minimal education, they were subjected to economic exploitation to a greater degree than other immigrant groups. 

Mexicans lived in areas of what is now the United States since before they were incorporated into the Union. Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California were under the Mexican flag until the Mexican-American War of 1846–48. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo signed in 1848 between the two countries ceded this territory to the United States for $15 million.

Puerto Rico

The United States defeated Spain in a brief war in 1898. In the ensuing Treaty of Paris, Spain gave up Puerto Rico, the Philippine Islands, and Guam to the Americans. The United States also reluctantly agreed to the island of Cuba’s independence under that treaty. However, Americans retained sovereignty over Puerto Rico, viewing it as critical to US defenses in the event of an attack from the Caribbean. In 1953, Puerto Rico achieved Commonwealth status, becoming a self-governing territory. 

Following World War II, thousands of Puerto Ricans moved to the continental United States. In the immediate postwar period, airplane fares to the mainland sold for as little as seventy-five dollars. Because they were US citizens by law, Puerto Rican immigrants were required only to demonstrate proof of birth in Puerto Rico before entering the continental United States. During the early 2020s, they made up the second-largest Hispanic American community, numbering about 5.9 million in 2022. 

YearEventImpact1910–1920Mexican RevolutionTen years of political and economic chaos force a quarter million Mexicans to resettle north of the U.S.-Mexico border.1942–1964Wartime labor shortages create a need for farmworkers that is filled by a Mexican and U.S. program that brings Mexicans to the United States to work the fields. The program establishes a pattern of migration of farmworkers.1945–1950Following World War II, inexpensive economy air flights permit thousands of Puerto Ricans to resettle in the New York area. Since Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens, no official entry papers are required.1957–1960Cuban RevolutionThe takeover by the leftist Fidel Castro sends more than one million Cuban businesspeople and professionals to Miami.1980–1990Civil wars in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala send more than one million political and economic refugees north, mostly to California and the East Coast.1981–1990sThe continuing erratic behavior of the Mexican economy, in addition to the inability of the country to provide employment for those entering the workforce each year, sends a constant wave of Mexican immigrants north to find work.2000–2020sEconomic crises and unpopular dictatorships cause many people in countries such as Venezuela and Paraguay to move to the US, leading to growth rates far higher than those experienced in more established groups like Mexicans.

Cuba

The takeover in 1959 of the island of Cuba by Fidel Castro and his supporters resulted in a mass exodus of much of the country’s upper-class and middle-class professional and business interests. They did not not agree with what eventually became a socialist, Communist-supported regime. Numbering close to one million people, most of those refugees established themselves initially in the greater Miami area. In the spring of 1980, the Mariel boatlift brought a second wave of refugees, numbering approximately one hundred thousand people with the permission of both the Castro regime and the administration of President Jimmy Carter. The Cuban American community, numbering about 2.4 million in 2022 and still centered in southern Florida, developed into a powerful economic and political force. 

Central America

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, the countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua were plagued by civil wars. As a consequence of those unsettled political times, between one and one and one-half million Central American refugees entered the United States. Nicaraguans had easy access, since the United States compared the leftist government of Daniel Ortega to Castro’s regime in Cuba. US supporters of Salvadoran and Guatemalan refugees insisted on the same opportunity for victims of political oppression in those countries as well. this was known as the Sanctuary movement.  

Most of these three groups continued to remain in the US through one form of amnesty or another, concentrating in California, Florida, and communities on the Eastern seaboard. In 2022, Salvadorans made up the third-largest Latino population in the United States, with nearly 2.5 million people of Salvadoran origin living in the US that year. Meanwhile, those from Honduras and Guatemala saw huge increases in population between 2010 and 2022. The growth rates of people from Honduras in the US increased by 67 percent, while Guatemalans rose by 62 percent.  

Dominican Republic

As with the case with many of the small Caribbean island nations, the Dominican Republic was unable to furnish enough job opportunities for all its citizens. Depending primarily on the export of sugar, some mining, and the attraction of cruise ships to its ports, the Dominican, which shared the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, also exported a substantial number of its working-class citizenry. The Dominican population to the US also experienced significant growth during the period between 2010 and 2022, with a 59 percent increase to over 2.3 million Dominicans in the US in 2022. Many Dominican immigrants gravitated to the New York and Boston metro areas after arriving in the United States. 

Other Latin Americans

Among Latinos experiencing the fastest population growth in the US during the early twenty-first century were people from Venezuela. The number of Venezuelans in the US increased by 236 percent between 2010 and 2022. This growth was attributed to an increase in people wishing to flee from the authoritarian regime in Venezuela and ongoing economic turmoil in that country due to falling oil prices and the COVID-19 pandemic.  

The balance of the Latin American countries also contributed immigrants, although generally as smaller percentages of their total populations. For example, the drug trade and the resulting political unrest caused Bolivians, Peruvians, and Colombians to seek asylum in the United States, which continued to represent a beacon of hope to citizens of those countries where political disorder or economic deprivation threaten the lives of their citizens. 

Diversity vs. Unity

Despite the formidable growth of the Latino element in US society, its diversity prevented the group from reaching its potential as a unitary political force. Instead, the members of each particular ethnicity showed a preference to confine their organizational efforts to members of their own particular community. They sought to establish themselves as Mexican American, Cuban American, or Puerto Rican political associations, with membership confined to their own ethnic group. Nevertheless, should there come a time when diverse organizations such as these come to realize the potential strength that their combined numbers represented, the fast-growing Latino contingent could become a major factor in determining the course of the future of the United States. In the interim, Latino immigrants and their offspring followed the paths of other racial and ethnic minorities in US society in past decades. Many, showed a high degree of individual initiative and worked their way into positions of greater responsibility in business and politics.  

Recent Trends

During the first two decades of the twenty-first century, several trends caused the socioeconomic and demographic characteristics of Latino groups in the US to change substantially. In addition to a shift in the countries of origin moving to the USleading to a more diverse Latino population overallLatinos expanded their population in several states where numbers had previously been low. Southern states such as Kentucky, Alabama, South Carolina, and Tennessee saw significant Latino population growth. North and South Dakota also experienced substantial growth in Latino populations. In addition, more Latinos identified as belonging to more than one race than ever before. In 2022, over 27 million Latinos identified as multiracial, according to the US Census. Other changes included a rise in the median age of many Latino groups, a higher number of female Latinos in the US, and an increasing likelihood of Latinos to be US-bornespecially among those of Mexican and Panamanian descent. In addition to being more likely to speak English proficiently, Latinos in the US made other gains, such as becoming more likely to hold a college degree, achieving higher rates of labor force participation, and experiencing lower rates of poverty than were recorded during the twentieth century. 

In the 2020s, as the birth rate among the native-born population in the United States began to drop, the younger portion of this demographic began contracting and older segments began to grow as a percentage of the total population. This was best exemplified in the deep Southern state of Texas. In 2022, Texas enjoyed the world's eighth-largest economy, ahead of entire nations such as Canada. A strong labor force was needed to sustain this developmental growth and was supplied by immigrants. Beginning in 2023, Hispanics overtook the White population as the state's largest demographic. These changes resulted in many nativist movements that sought to overturn these societal changes they believed were occurring because of large-scale immigration into the United States. 

During the 2024 presidential elections, the issue of immigration was at the forefront of American political campaigns. The Republican Party made immigration a primary opposition strategy during the presidency of Democrat Joe Biden (2021-2025). Republican governors took up the immigration mantle during the interim period between the 2020 and 2024 campaigns with actions that kept the immigration issue as a constantly reported topic in the media. These included actions such as the Republican-led effort to impeach the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Alexander Mayorkas. Other highly publicized actions included Texas governor Greg Abbot deploying the Texas National Guard to its border with Mexico and Florida governorRon DeSantis’ campaign to bus immigrants to northern states. By 2024, these efforts aligned with many Americans who viewed immigration controls as a national priority and favored more entry restrictions. Democratic Party candidates at the national and state levels shifted their messaging to align more closely with this trend.

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