Latinos Will Surpass the 55 Million Mark

So now that we’re 42 states into the 50-state Census roll-out reveal it’s a good time to pause to see where we are and what to expect. Back in the day (it’s only been 5 months but it seems like an eternity) when Carlos Guerra, Sara Inés Calderón, Gilberto Ocañas and I sat for coffee at the Foundry in San Antonio to plot News Taco we were convinced that the US Census was going to be a startling revelation. We wagered that the count would show at least 55 million Latinos in the United States – far more than most estimates had predicted. It turns out there’s some good ju-ju in the Foundry coffee because our aim was dead-on.
Portada Magazine has a very good breakdown of the count so far; it’s concise and bulleted, and I like concise and bulleted. Some highlights:

• Hispanic population growth is exceeding the most recent Census estimates by 4.3 percent.
• More than 45 million Hispanics in the 42 states released as of 3-17-11.
• Hispanics contributed 54 percent of the overall population growth in those states.
• From Census 2000-2010, the Hispanic population in these states grew by 45 percent.
• Hispanics are growing four times faster than the total U.S. population.

There are 14 million more Latinos in the 42 states already counted than there were ten years ago.

At this rate, by the time it’s over, Latinos are expected to surpass the 55 million mark.

Commit that number to memory because it’s going to be the foundation upon which all discussions are going to to be built: politics, education, jobs, heath care, immigration, military, transportation, and on and on…we knew it back then, we’ll be adamant about it now.

follow Victor Landa on Twitter: @vlanda