2020 Census Results Show Big Changes to America's Racial and Ethnic Makeup
AllSides Summary
According to the 2020 United States Census, the U.S. is 57.8% white, 18.7% Hispanic, 12.4% Black and 6% Asian. The white population decreased in size by 8.6%, the first drop on record. Other key takeaways: the multiracial population grew by 276%; the Asian population grew by 36%; the Hispanic population grew by 23%; the black population grew by 6%; the number of people who identify as Native American or Alaska Native grew by 27.1%; and the total U.S. population grew 7.35%, the lowest rate since the Great Depression.
The census results were major news in outlets across the political spectrum. Many focused on how the white population shrank while minority populations expanded. Some analyzed how the country's changing racial and ethnic makeup will impact politics, and how the census data in general will influence redistricting.
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From the Right
U.S. Is Becoming More Urban and More Ethnically Diverse, Says Census Bureau
"U.S. population is much more multiracial and more diverse than what we measured in the past," said Nicholas Jones, the Census Bureau's director of race and ethnicity research, in a press release today.
According to last year's census data, whites remain the country's largest racial or ethnic group. About 204.3 million people described themselves as white without also identifying with another group. (Another 31.1 million Americans identified both as white and with another group.) Still, the population identifying as white alone decreased by 8.6 percent since the previous census in 2010.
America's...
From the Left
US sees unprecedented multiracial growth, decline in the white population for first time in history
The United States experienced unprecedented multiracial population growth and a decline in the white population for the first time in the nation’s history, according to U.S. Census officials, who released data Thursday revealing the most sweeping picture of America’s racial and ethnic makeup in a decade.
“These changes reveal that the US population is much more multiracial, and more racially and ethnically diverse, than what we measured in the past,” said Nicholas Jones, the director of race, ethnicity, research and outreach for the Census Bureau's population division.
The white, non-Hispanic population, without another...
From the Center
Native American population jumps to largest size in modern history
The number of people who identify as Native American or Alaska Native alone grew by 27.1% to 3.7 million people over the last decade, according to the U.S. Census.
Why it matter: The spike in the number of people who solely identify as Native American or Alaska Native mirrors the steady rise of the population since 1890, when Indigenous people were nearly wiped out in the U.S.
The Native American population was reduced to fewer than 250,000 people before the 20th century, following decades of mass extermination, forced boarding schools and...
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