Why do Hispanic South Texas overwhelming identify as white?

[TheReckoning]

For example, in Rio Grande City, Texas, something like 90%+ of Latinos identify as white. That’s way higher than the national average, and way higher than the actual percentage that are predominantly European. So why do they identify as such?

[If my soul was made of stone]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

[kwabbit]

Are you asking why they don't identify as Native? The Mexican and Hispano population in South Texas doesn't have significant African ancestry in the way a Dominican/Puerto Rican/Venezuelan/etc. would. They might have significant Native ancestry, as most 'Mestizos' do, but they wouldn't identify with any specific Native ancestor because all of their ancestors for hundreds of year are also Mestizo.

In most Latin culture, it's considered preferable to be White versus Black or Indigenous. Therefore, since this entire population has some White ancestry, they all identify as White.

[TheReckoning]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Do you know why CA Latinos identify differently? Are CA Latinos more recent immigrants than South Texas Latinos? If so, why didn’t more Latinos settle in CA while Mexico controlled it relative to Texas?

Also, doesn’t being Non-white have nothing to do with being an immigrant?

[Schiff for Senate]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

HRC's thing was more like, she slipped quite a bit in some parts of South Texas, but actually gained in other parts. In fact Will Hurd's (now Tony Gonzales') district flipped from Romney to Clinton in 2016, though that might have to do with its eastern boundaries reaching the San Antonio (or maybe Austin; I might be confusing the two) area.

[Kamala's side hoe]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Do you know why CA Latinos identify differently? Are CA Latinos more recent immigrants than South Texas Latinos? If so, why didn’t more Latinos settle in CA while Mexico controlled it relative to Texas?

ITT: why de facto definitions of “race” are a “social construct”.

Probably because Texas is part of the US South and has the whole historical White-Black dichotomy going on? So cultural groups who have some European ancestry but no visible African ancestry like Tejanos thought of themselves as “white” and not “black”?

[Former President tack50]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Doesn't this also apply to parts of New Mexico where Dems have held up much better? Why were NM Dems successful where TX Dems failed?

[RI]

This is no longer the case as of the 2020 Census. RGV Hispanics do identify as more white and less than "some other race" than average but not "overwhelmingly" as they did on the 2010 Census. Hispanics were far more likely to identify as multiracial in 2020 than in 2010, and that extends to the RGV as well.

Nationally, Hispanics on the 2020 Census identified as:

41% Some Other Race
34% Multiracial
20% White
  2% Native
  2% Black

In the RGV, Hispanics identified as:

43% Multiracial
33% White
23% Some Other Race
  1% Native

The areas Hispanics were most likely to identify as white were Appalachia and other very rural white areas throughout the country.



If you just consider white vs. "some other race" then the map looks like this, where totals sum to far more than 100%:

[King of Kensington]

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-09-09/south-los-angeles-immigration-displacement-latinos-blacks-2020-census

[GM Team Member and Deputy PPT WB]

This is no longer the case as of the 2020 Census. RGV Hispanics do identify as more white and less than "some other race" than average but not "overwhelmingly" as they did on the 2010 Census. Hispanics were far more likely to identify as multiracial in 2020 than in 2010, and that extends to the RGV as well.

Nationally, Hispanics on the 2020 Census identified as:

41% Some Other Race
34% Multiracial
20% White
  2% Native
  2% Black

In the RGV, Hispanics identified as:

43% Multiracial
33% White
23% Some Other Race
  1% Native

The areas Hispanics were most likely to identify as white were Appalachia and other very rural white areas throughout the country.



If you just consider white vs. "some other race" then the map looks like this, where totals sum to far more than 100%:

What's with that one county in the dakotas identifying as black? I'd assume it's just due to there being very few people there, but is there any reason one could find?

[RINO Tom]

I don’t know, but “Hispanic” is so historically confused in an ethnic sense and should be retired … pointless, stupid term.  A Portuguese American is just a plain old, Non-Hispanic White European American, but a Spanish American is “Hispanic American,” and a Moroccan darker than both is just White, as well.  People should be identified, if they’re going to be identified at all in this way, by their ethnic background from a historical perspective, not whatever nonsense the Census calls “race.”

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Actually, across South Texas as a whole (which is over 80% Hispanic by VAP now, and has over 3 million people living there), Clinton in 2016 did better than Obama either time, and O Rourke in 2018 did even better than that.

[Indy Texas 🇺🇦🇵🇸]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Do you know why CA Latinos identify differently? Are CA Latinos more recent immigrants than South Texas Latinos? If so, why didn’t more Latinos settle in CA while Mexico controlled it relative to Texas?

Also, doesn’t being Non-white have nothing to do with being an immigrant?

The RGV was "settled" when the area was under Spanish and Mexican rule. It's adjacent to a river, near the ocean, and has fertile land for farming and ranching. South Texas is basically a gradual gradient transition from the culture Southern United States to that of northern Mexico.

The area of California right next to the Mexican border is mostly desert. Nobody was really living there in the pre-US era. There is no gradient between the US and Mexico on the California border. It's a very stark, abrupt shift. While the cities along the Texas-Mexico border always had pretty high Hispanic populations, San Diego was historically a much whiter place. If you were a Mexican wanting to move north for work opportunities, you had to go up to the Central Valley or at least Los Angeles.

[TransfemmeGoreVidal]

Because many have lived there as long as most white Americans. Other then being Catholic they really aren’t that culturally different then most white southerners and in that respect the Rio Grande could almost be thought of as the last holdout region for Democrats in the white south which makes it a surprise that the 2020 swings didn’t happen sooner.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I don’t know, but “Hispanic” is so historically confused in an ethnic sense and should be retired … pointless, stupid term.  A Portuguese American is just a plain old, Non-Hispanic White European American, but a Spanish American is “Hispanic American,” and a Moroccan darker than both is just White, as well.  People should be identified, if they’re going to be identified at all in this way, by their ethnic background from a historical perspective, not whatever nonsense the Census calls “race.”

But Hispanic is not a separate race on the Census.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

I don’t know, but “Hispanic” is so historically confused in an ethnic sense and should be retired … pointless, stupid term.  A Portuguese American is just a plain old, Non-Hispanic White European American, but a Spanish American is “Hispanic American,” and a Moroccan darker than both is just White, as well.  People should be identified, if they’re going to be identified at all in this way, by their ethnic background from a historical perspective, not whatever nonsense the Census calls “race.”

But Hispanic is not a separate race on the Census.

It's still dumb. Hispanic as a category tells us very little that "Mestizo" or "White" or "Afro-Latino" wouldn't. We can still leave in the Hispanic category box, but at the very least we should probably aim to encourage a better use of the race category box too (ie, putting Two or More Races/Mixed/Mestizo or something like that where it currently stands as Two or More Races, or Black/African-American/Afro-Latino where it's currently just Black or African-American).

[The Mikado]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Do you know why CA Latinos identify differently? Are CA Latinos more recent immigrants than South Texas Latinos? If so, why didn’t more Latinos settle in CA while Mexico controlled it relative to Texas?

Also, doesn’t being Non-white have nothing to do with being an immigrant?

No one really "immigrates" into South Texas anymore. It's one of the poorest and most destitute regions of the entire country. If you're an immigrant, you keep going until you hit San Antonio or Austin or Houston or Dallas, you don't stay in Brownsville or McAllen or Laredo. Therefore, the population of those regions have been here a LONG time. Many are Tejanos whose ancestors were living here when Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed and never "immigrated" because they were here before that area was even part of the US. Others have great-grandparents or great-great-grandparents who fled north of the border in the 1910s during the chaos of the Mexican Revolution.

Even that latter group has ancestors who came to the US at the same time my ancestors fled Russia in the 1910s and talking about "immigrant" issues when talking to South Texas people seems condescending and insulting, like you're implying they're somehow less American when their families have been in the United States for over a century or possibly essentially forever. Add to that that many South Texas people work in oil and gas (an industry that the Democrats openly talk about dreaming about shutting down) or in the border patrol (an organization that Democrats openly talk about abolishing) and there's some serious friction with the values of the Democratic Party.

As for racial identity, a lot of it is just that there simply aren't Anglo white people down there. In an area that's 90%+ Hispanic, it's just flat out stupid to tell people about the white people keeping them down or whatever when their bosses are Hispanic, the people running the bank are Hispanic, the government is all Hispanic, etc. You can't really have the racial dynamics you have in other parts of the country in an essentially homogenous society.

[King of Kensington]

What percentage of the population of South Texas is foreign born?

[Torie]

What percentage of the population of South Texas is foreign born?

The difference between Hispanic adults and Hispanic citizen adults is next to nothing. So unless foreign born and now mostly citizens, Hispanic immigrants crossing the river do indeed just keep on going. The RGV is too much like where they are from as has been suggested.

[ChiefFireWaterMike]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

Do you know why CA Latinos identify differently? Are CA Latinos more recent immigrants than South Texas Latinos? If so, why didn’t more Latinos settle in CA while Mexico controlled it relative to Texas?

Also, doesn’t being Non-white have nothing to do with being an immigrant?

No one really "immigrates" into South Texas anymore. It's one of the poorest and most destitute regions of the entire country. If you're an immigrant, you keep going until you hit San Antonio or Austin or Houston or Dallas, you don't stay in Brownsville or McAllen or Laredo. Therefore, the population of those regions have been here a LONG time. Many are Tejanos whose ancestors were living here when Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed and never "immigrated" because they were here before that area was even part of the US. Others have great-grandparents or great-great-grandparents who fled north of the border in the 1910s during the chaos of the Mexican Revolution.

Even that latter group has ancestors who came to the US at the same time my ancestors fled Russia in the 1910s and talking about "immigrant" issues when talking to South Texas people seems condescending and insulting, like you're implying they're somehow less American when their families have been in the United States for over a century or possibly essentially forever. Add to that that many South Texas people work in oil and gas (an industry that the Democrats openly talk about dreaming about shutting down) or in the border patrol (an organization that Democrats openly talk about abolishing) and there's some serious friction with the values of the Democratic Party.

As for racial identity, a lot of it is just that there simply aren't Anglo white people down there. In an area that's 90%+ Hispanic, it's just flat out stupid to tell people about the white people keeping them down or whatever when their bosses are Hispanic, the people running the bank are Hispanic, the government is all Hispanic, etc. You can't really have the racial dynamics you have in other parts of the country in an essentially homogenous society.

The vast majority of Tejanos have been there far longer than there's been a border. Its more correct to call non Tejanos immigrants than the other way around. Great post, the entire thing.

[Southern Reactionary Dem]

They've been there for centuries and don't identify with more recent immigrants. This misunderstanding has been quite costly for the Dems in this part of the world as of late (not just in 2020; HRC and Beto's performances were underwhelming too).

This goes all the way back to Wendy Davis and Battleground Texas. Every time they've tried to do a turnout operation in the RGV, it has turned out badly. I read an article about Battleground Texas at the time (post mortem) and they determined that their efforts had likely turned out at least some voters for Greg Abbott.

[All Along The Watchtower]

I don’t know, but “Hispanic” is so historically confused in an ethnic sense and should be retired … pointless, stupid term.  A Portuguese American is just a plain old, Non-Hispanic White European American, but a Spanish American is “Hispanic American,” and a Moroccan darker than both is just White, as well.  People should be identified, if they’re going to be identified at all in this way, by their ethnic background from a historical perspective, not whatever nonsense the Census calls “race.”

But Hispanic is not a separate race on the Census.

Preach, BRTD!

[jimrtex]

I don’t know, but “Hispanic” is so historically confused in an ethnic sense and should be retired … pointless, stupid term.  A Portuguese American is just a plain old, Non-Hispanic White European American, but a Spanish American is “Hispanic American,” and a Moroccan darker than both is just White, as well.  People should be identified, if they’re going to be identified at all in this way, by their ethnic background from a historical perspective, not whatever nonsense the Census calls “race.”

But Hispanic is not a separate race on the Census.

Preach, BRTD!

The definitions are not those of the Census Bureau, but of the OMB. They let the Census Bureau let people designate any combination of 6 "races" so long as they can be collapsed into the OMB categories.