The Least Latino State in the Union

Someone had to have that distinction, what with all the Census numbers and head counting going on.

It turns out that West Virginia is the least Latino state in the US – based on raw population data. According to Immigration Prof Blog, edited by four law professors from around the country,

Latinos are slightly just over one percent of the state population, (West Virgina) is the state with the smallest percentage of Latinos in the United States. The 2009 Census estimates that Hispanics make up 1.26 percent – or 22,662 — of the state’s 1.8 million residents. That represented a growth for the state’s Latinos, who comprised .7 percent of West Virginians in 2000, and .5 percent in 1990, according to Census data.

Did someone say road trip?

Look at it this way, even at that level there’s been a 44 percent Latino population growth in that state in the last twenty years. Ever think you’d see Latinos forming communities in the Blue Ridge Mountains? There’s more than 22 thousand of them living there right now.

Follow Victor Landa on Twitter @vlanda.