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The Long History of Anti-Latino Discrimination in America | HISTORY

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School segregation, lynchings and mass deportations of Spanish-speaking U.S. citizens are just some of the injustices Latinos have faced.

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Latino Americans | Foreigners in Their Own Land | PBS

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Latino Americans | Foreigners in Their Own Land | PBS

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Video: Opinion | A Conversation With Latinos on Race

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In this short documentary, Latinos grapple with defining their ethnic and racial identities.

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On The Census, Who Checks 'Hispanic,' Who Checks 'White,' And Why

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On The Census, Who Checks 'Hispanic,' Who Checks 'White,' And Why

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We've been talking a lot lately about how who fills out the Census in what way. It's an ongoing preoccupation of Code Switch, and one shared by Julie Dowling. Dowling, a University of Illinois sociologist, whose book, Mexican Americans and the Question of Race, came out earlier this year. (As the daughter of a Mexican-American mother and Irish-American father, Dowling knows all about the complexities of filling out the race question on the Census form.)

I interviewed Dowling about her research, and she shared some fascinating insights about the gap between how people fill in Census forms and how they think of themselves
On the history of 'Hispanic' on the Census Questionnaire
In 1930, "Mexican" was put on the Census [questionnaire] as a race. This was during the Depression and it was a time period when [the government was] rounding up people. They used the Census in the 1940s to locate Japanese-Americans for internment camps. So people didn't want to be identifiable on the Census because they were afraid of the government.

Today, everyone wants to be counted. Now everyone wants representation. But at that time period, people did not want that. And they also did not want to be racialized. This was a time where the best avenue for people to fit in was to claim whiteness.

In 1929, the League of the United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), a Mexican-American organization, formed in Corpus Christi, TX. One of their main organizing efforts was to get "Mexican" off the 1930 census. They protested: we are white race, we are Americans.

The Mexican government itself protested the category, because the entire Southwest used to be part of Mexico, and when it was taken over by the United States, they promised Mexico that the Mexican residents there would be treated as full citizens. Well, at the time, you had to be white to be a citizen. So that's where the whole issue came about of Mexicans, specifically, identifying as legally white but socially not-white.

It worked against them in some ways, because they claimed segregation and discrimination, the parties being accused of discrimination could say, Well, no, you're white. So this history of claiming whiteness has been a strategy that Mexican Americans and other Latino groups have used to try to lobby for acceptance - claiming Americanness, claiming whiteness.

LULAC and the Mexican government successfully had "Mexican" removed from [the census questionnaire]. After 1930, there has never been another Latino group listed as a race on it. In 1970, the Hispanic origin question was first introduced on the Census long form, which is an extended questionnaire that goes out to about one in six households. And then, finally in 1980, the Hispanic identity question appears on all of the forms. It used to come after the race question. They later moved it before the race question because it was one of the most unanswered forms on the census. If you asked people their race, "I'm white or I'm black," and they would get this next question, "are you Hispanic?" They would say "I already answered this," and they would skip it. So that's why we have them the way they are and the way they're ordered.

And importantly, Latinos can be of a variety of racial backgrounds. People can be Afro-Latino and be white and be Latino and there are a whole lot of Latinos who are brown. So there's the issue of not wanting to be racialized, and there's the racial diversity of Latinos themselves.
On the Census considering including Hispanic as a race in 2020
The Census did this really big, comprehensive project where they sent out 17 different alternative questionnaires of the 2010 Census. And some of those were a combined question, where they actually put Hispanic or Latino in there, alongside racial groups. So they had more than 750 households involved in this, and they went back and they interviewed about one in six of those individuals who filled out that form. They got a telephone re-interview, where they got called back.

"You checked white for your race. Is that how you identify in your daily life? Is that how other people see you?"

They found that for Latinos, those who checked white did not identify with the term. So about half of Latinos who checked white on the Census, when they called them back, a very nominal amount of them thought of themselves as white. [The interviewers] asked them, "So why did you check this?" And they said, "Because there was nothing else. I don't fit anywhere else. There's nothing else to put. "

The combined question model doesn't actually call Latino a race. The question asks about a person's race or origin, so they just put them together. It has white and black and it has an option for Hispanic or Latino origin, and it says "check all that apply." And that's an important component because for some people it's a race and for others it may be an origin. Somebody may think of themselves as racially black and ethnically Hispanic. This gives them the option so they can mark, "I am black and I am Hispanic." If they feel like Hispanic/Latino is their sole identification in those categories, they can just mark that.

And so it worked really, really well for them: about 80 percent of Latinos put just Hispanic or Latino for the combined model, and the number of people who checked white went from being half to between 9 and 16 percent, depending on which of the questionnaires they were using. It dramatically decreased the number of Latinos who checked white.
Who Checks White, Who Checks 'Other,' And Why
Most academics have hypothesized, like Nate Cohn did, that it has to do with assimilation - cultural assimilation, structural assimilation. Or they think it has to do with color: lighter skinned people check white, darker skinned people check "other."

What I've found in my research is that in Texas, two-thirds of the Latino population checks white. And if you look at where they check white, all along the U.S.-Mexico border, 80 to 90 percent of them are checking white. These are areas where there's a lot of Spanish language maintenance, there are high immigrant populations, and in many of these populations there are a lot of low-income people. When you look at the national data for who checks white and who checks "other," you see people who check white are a little higher income, a little higher educated, perhaps less likely to speak Spanish. That's what Sonya Tafoya found in her Pew Report called Shades Of Belonging. What I looked at and found in Texas was that it was actually the lowest-income group that was most likely to check white. And that people who checked white were as likely to speak Spanish as those who checked "other race."

And so I looked at is as measure of ideology: those people who checked white were more identified with this ideology of using whiteness as a strategy, while those who checked other were more identified with anti-racist politics, or they identified more or with immigrants with African-Americans. So it wasn't so much color or assimilation, but what strategy they use to combat the discrimination they faced. Because the overwhelming majority of the people I spoke to experienced discrimination - whether they identified as white or whether they identified as other. Some of the lightest people checked other and some of the darkest people checked white. It wasn't a skin color issue or an assimilation issue: It's a strategic issue.
The Definition of 'Hispanic' And 'Latino' Varies By Region
In Texas, the term that's most commonly used is not Latino, it's Hispanic. When I interviewed people, and asked "Who is Hispanic?" the most common response that I got was: "It's someone of Mexican origin who was born here." And part of that is the overwhelming majority of [Latinos in] the state are people of Mexican origin, so they use that term.

This is similar to New Mexico. Hispanic became the category that means a U.S.-born Mexican-American person. For example, when I was doing an interview some place, [I told] one of my key informants that I wanted to interview some immigrants. She said, "I didn't know you wanted to interview immigrants, too. I thought you just wanted to interview Hispanics."

If you ask somebody in New York who is Hispanic, they're going to give you a different answer. If you talk to somebody in Florida, they're going to have a different answer. So these terms have different meanings throughout this country. And so we have this federal form in the Census that goes out - how do you capture that?

There's a number of individuals who [identify as Hispanic but don't specify a national origin] - in the 2000 Census it was 17 percent, in the most recent 2010 Census it was 8 percent. They just check Hispanic on the questionnaire. And a lot of those individuals live in Texas and New Mexico. And they are telling the Census that they're Hispanic, but to them that means, "I'm Mexican and I'm born here."
A Whole Lot of 'Other' People
"Some other race" is now the third largest racial group after white and black - black, white and other. Come 2020, the way the demographics are shifting, it would become the second-largest race in this country. This isn't the '50s anymore. We don't live in - and we never have lived, frankly - in a black/white/other world. There are lots of groups here and we deserve recognition, and to be included.There's a lot of fear out there about what this means, and a lot of it is sort of people not understanding that they're not trying to homogenize Latinos into one racial category. It's about giving people more options, not less options, to identify themselves.

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On The Census, Who Checks 'Hispanic,' Who Checks 'White,' And Why

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Lots of people who said they were Hispanic on the 2000 Census who changed their answer on the race question in 2010. There are lots of possible reasons: history, geography - even the questionnaire.

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First Latino U.S. Senator  : Octaviano Larrazolo of New Mexico became the first Hispanic elected to the U.S. Senate. As a politician, he pushed to boost Hispanic representation so that the political system would reflect the state’s population. He also helped write portions of the state’s constitution guaranteeing that people of Mexican descent wouldn’t be disfranchised.

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Before Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, the courts ruled it unconstitutional to segregate students of Mexican heritage into inferior schools. The plaintiff, Sylvia Mendez, sued after being turned away from a “whites only” public school in California.

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Delano Grape Pickers Strike Of 1965-1970

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Delano Grape Pickers Strike Of 1965-1970

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In 1965, Filipino and Latino farmworker unions joined in a strike, and later a boycott of grapes in the Delano area of California to protest poor conditions. The five-year campaign ultimately succeeded in forcing the grape producers to sign union contracts.

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Roberto Clemente Helps Change MLB History

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Roberto Clemente Helps Change MLB History

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Latino Civil Rights Timeline, 1903 to 2006

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Latino Civil Rights Timeline, 1903 to 2006

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This piece is meant to be used with the following lessons: " Understanding the History of Latino Civil Rights" and " Exploring the History of Latino Civil Rights."

When reading this timeline, it's important to remember that the fight for civil rights doesn't happen in a vacuum. In many cases, the events listed below have fueled-and have been fueled by-other social justice movements, like the African American Civil Rights Movement and the fight for equal employment and education among Chinese and Japanese immigrants.

The Latino civil rights struggle did not begin in 1903 and will not end in September 2006. Watch the news and listen to politicians, and you will see the fight for equal rights for ALL people is not over.

1900s

1903 In Oxnard, Calif., more than 1,200 Mexican and Japanese farm workers organize the first farm worker union, the Japanese-Mexican Labor Association (JMLA). Later, it will be the first union to win a strike against the California agricultural industry, which already has become a powerful force.

1904 The U.S. establishes the first border patrol as a way to keep Asian laborers from entering the country by way of Mexico.

1905 Labor organizer Lucy Gonzales Parsons, from San Antonio, Texas, helps found the Wobblies, the Industrial Workers of the World.

1910s

1910 The Mexican Revolution forces Mexicans to cross the border into the United States, in search of safety and employment.

1911 The first large convention of Mexicans to organize against social injustice, El Primer Congreso Mexicanista, meets in Laredo, Texas.

1912 New Mexico enters the union as an officially bilingual state, authorizing funds for voting in both Spanish and English, as well as for bilingual education. Article XII of the state constitution also prohibits segregation for children of "Spanish descent." At the state's constitutional convention six years earlier, Mexican American delegates mandated Spanish and English be used for all state business.

1914 The Colorado militia attacks striking coal miners in what becomes known as the Ludlow Massacre. More than 50 people are killed, mostly Mexican Americans, including 11 children and three women.

1917 Factories in war-related industries need more workers, as Americans leave for war. Latinos from the Southwest begin moving north in large numbers for the first time. They find ready employment as machinists, mechanics, furniture finishers, upholsterers, printing press workers, meat packers and steel mill workers.

1917 The U.S. Congress passes the Jones Act, granting citizenship to Puerto Ricans under U.S. military rule since the end of the Spanish-American War.

1920s

1921 San Antonio's Orden Hijos de América (Order of the Sons of America) organizes Latino workers to raise awareness of civil rights issues and fight for fair wages, education and housing.

1921 The Immigration Act of 1921 restricts the entry of southern and eastern Europeans. Agricultural businesses successfully oppose efforts to limit the immigration of Mexicans.

1927 In Los Angeles, the Confederación de Uniones Obreras Mexicanas (Federation of Mexican Workers Union-CUOM) becomes the first large-scale effort to organize and consolidate Mexican workers.

1928 Octaviano Larrazolo of New Mexico becomes the first Latino U.S. Senator.

1929 Several Latino service organizations merge to form the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). The group organizes against discrimination and segregation and promotes education among Latinos. It's the largest and longest-lasting Latino civil rights group in the country.

1930s

1931 The country's first labor strike incited by a cultural conflict happens in Ybor City (Tampa), Fla., when the owners of cigar factories attempt to get rid of the lectores, people who read aloud from books and magazines as a way to help cigar rollers pass the time. The owners accuse the lectores of radicalizing the workers and replace them with radios. The workers walk out.

1932 Benjamin Nathan Cardozo, a Sephardic Jew, becomes the first Latino named to the U.S. Supreme Court.

1933 Latino unions in California lead the El Monte Strike, possibly the largest agricultural strike at that point in history, to protest the declining wage rate for strawberry pickers. By May 1933, wages dropped to nine cents an hour. In July, growers agreed to a settlement including a wage increase to 20 cents an hour, or $1.50 for a nine-hour day of work.

1938 On December 4, El Congreso del Pueblo de Habla Española (The Spanish-Speaking Peoples Congress) holds its first conference in Los Angeles. Founded by Luisa Moreno and led by Josefina Fierro de Bright, it's the first national effort to bring together Latino workers from different ethnic backgrounds: Cubans and Spaniards from Florida, Puerto Ricans from New York, Mexicans and Mexican Americans from the Southwest.

1939 Novelist John Steinbeck publishes The Grapes of Wrath, calling attention to the plight of migrant workers in the California grape-growing industry.

1940s

1941 The U.S. government forms the Fair Employment Practices Committee to handle cases of employment discrimination. Latino workers file more than one-third of all complaints from the Southwest.

1942 The Bracero Program begins, allowing Mexican citizens to work temporarily in the United States. U.S. growers support the program as a source or low-cost labor. The program welcomes millions of Mexican workers into the U.S. until it ends in 1964.

1942 Hundreds of thousands of Latinos serve in the armed forces during World War II.

1943 Los Angeles erupts in the Zoot Suit Riots, the worst race riots in the city to date. For 10 nights, American sailors cruise Mexican American neighborhoods in search of "zoot-suiters" -- hip, young Mexican teens dressed in baggy pants and long-tailed coats. The military men drag kids -- some as young as 12 years old -- out of movie theaters and cafes, tearing their clothes off and viciously beating them.

1944 Senator Dennis Chávez of New Mexico introduces the first Fair Employment Practices Bill, which prohibits discrimination because of race, creed or national origin. The bill fails, but is an important predecessor for the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

1945 Latino veterans return home with a new feeling of unity. Together, they seek equal rights in the country they defended. They use their G.I. benefits for personal advancement, college educations and buying homes. In 1948, they will organize the American G.I. Forum in Texas to combat discrimination and improve the status of Latinos; branches eventually form in 23 states.

1945 Mexican-American parents sue several California school districts, challenging the segregation of Latino students in separate schools. The California Supreme Court rules in the parents' favor in Mendez v. Westminster, arguing segregation violates children's constitutional rights. The case is an important precedent for Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.

1950s

1953 During "Operation Wetback" from 1953 and 1958, the U.S. Immigration Service arrests and deports more than 3.8 million Latin Americans. Many U.S. citizens are deported unfairly, including political activist Luisa Moreno and other community leaders.

1954 Hernandez v. Texas is the first post-WWII Latino civil rights case heard and decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. The Hernandez decision strikes down discrimination based on class and ethnic distinctions.

1960s

1962 Air flights between the U.S. and Cuba are suspended following the Cuban Missile Crisis. Prior to the Crisis, more than 200,000 of Cuba's wealthiest and most affluent professionals fled the country fearing reprisals from Fidel Castro's communist regime. Many believed Castro would be overthrown and they would soon be able to return to Cuba.

1963 Miami's Coral Way Elementary School offers the nation's first bilingual education program in public schools, thanks to a grant from the Ford Foundation.

1965 Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta found the United Farm Workers association, in Delano, Calif., which becomes the largest and most important farm worker union in the nation. Huerta becomes the first woman to lead such a union. Under their leadership, the UFW joins a strike started by Filipino grape pickers in Delano. The Grape Boycott becomes one of the most significant social justice movements for farm workers in the United States.

1965 Luis Valdez founds the world-famous El Teatro Campesino, the first farm worker theatre, in Delano, Calif. Actors entertain and educate farm workers about their rights.

1966 Congress passes the Cuban American Adjustment Act allowing Cubans who lived in America for at least one year to become permanent residents. No other immigrant group has been offered this privilege before, or since.

1968 Latino high school students in Los Angeles stage citywide walkouts protesting unequal treatment by the school district. Prior to the walkouts, Latino students were routinely punished for speaking Spanish on school property, not allowed to use the bathroom during lunch, and actively discouraged from going to college. Walkout participants are subjected to police brutality and public ridicule; 13 are arrested on charges of disorderly conduct and conspiracy. However, the walkouts eventually result in school reform and an increased college enrollment among Latino youth.

1968 The Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund opens its doors, becoming the first legal fund to pursue protection of the civil rights of Mexican Americans.

1969 Faced with slum housing, inadequate schools and rising unemployment, Puerto Rican youth in Chicago form the Young Lords Organization, inspired in part by the writings of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X. An outgrowth of the Young Lords street gang, the YLO becomes a vibrant community organization, creating free breakfast programs for kids and community health clinics. Modeled after the Black Panthers, the YLO uses direct action and political education to bring public attention to issues affecting their community. The group later spreads to New York City.

Throughout the 1970s Progressive organizations based in Mexican, Filipino, Arab and other immigrant communities begin organizing documented and undocumented workers. Together, they work for legalization and union rights against INS raids and immigration law enforcement brutality.

1970 The U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare issues a memorandum saying students cannot be denied access to educational programs because of an inability to speak English.

1974 In the case Lau v. Nichols, the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirms the 1970 memorandum, ruling students' access to, or participation in, an educational program cannot be denied because of their inability to speak or understand English. The lawsuit began as a class action by Chinese-speaking students against the school district in San Francisco, although the decision benefited other immigrant groups, as well.

1974 Congress passes the Equal Educational Opportunity Act of 1974 to make bilingual education more widely available in public schools.

1974 The first major Latino voter registration organization, the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project begins, registering more than two million Latino voters in the first 20 years.

1975 After non-English speakers testify about the discrimination they face at the polls, Congress votes to expand the U.S. Voting Rights Act to require language assistance at polling stations. Native Americans, Asian Americans, Alaska Natives and Latinos benefit most from this provision. The original Act, passed in 1965, applied only to blacks and Puerto Ricans. The Voting Rights Act leads to the increasing political representation of Latinos in U.S. politics.

1980s

1985 National religious organizations provide support for the first "National Consultation on Immigrant Rights." Immediately the group calls for a National Day of Action for Justice for Immigrants and Refugees, "to call attention to issues and to dramatize the positive role of immigrants in shaping U.S. society." More than 20 cities participate in the event.

1986 On November 6, Congress approves the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), providing legalization for certain undocumented workers, including agricultural workers. The Act also sets employer sanctions in place, making it illegal for employers to hire undocumented workers.

1988 President Ronald Reagan appoints Dr. Lauro Cavazos as Secretary of Education. He becomes the first Latino appointed to a presidential cabinet.

1989 Miami's Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Cuban American, becomes the first Latino woman elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.

1990s

1990 The California Delegation Against Hate Violence documents the increasing human rights abuses by INS agents and private citizens against migrants in the San Diego-Tijuana border area.

1992 The Los Angeles Police Department cracks down on Latino immigrants during the "Los Angeles rebellion," after the "not guilty" verdict in the Rodney King police brutality case.

1994-1995 The fight over California's Proposition 187 brings the debate over immigration --particularly undocumented immigration -- to the front pages of the national press. The ballot initiative galvanizes students across the state, who mount a widespread campaign in opposition. Voters approve the measure preventing undocumented immigrants from obtaining public services like education and health care.

1997 A U.S. District Court judge overturns California's Prop 187, ruling it unconstitutional.

1999 After sixty years of U.S. Navy exercise-bombings on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques, civil rights leaders in both Puerto Rican and African American communities respond with a non-violent protest galvanizing the island's 9,300 residents. Triggered by the accidental death of a Puerto Rican naval base employee during live ammunition exercises, Puerto Ricans unite in outrage, protesting the proximity of the exercises to civilians, years of environmental destruction and resulting health problems. The Navy failed to honor historical agreements to treat the island and its people respectfully. The protests culminate in lawsuits and the arrest of more than 180 protesters, with some serving unnecessarily harsh sentences. The Navy promises to stop bombing the island by 2003.

1999 The Immigration Law Enforcement Monitoring Project coordinates nationwide activities on Día de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead. Public displays of crosses, representing those who died crossing the border, capture public and media attention.

2000s

2001 Following the terrorist attacks of 9.11, Arab Americans and others of Middle Eastern descent experience a backlash in the United States, as hate crimes, harassment and police profiling sharply increase. Based in rising fears over "border security," the stigma spreads to other immigrant groups. Some politicians call for building a wall between the United States and Mexico. During the next five years, Latino immigrants face a surge in discrimination and bias.

2003 Latinos are pronounced the nation's largest minority group --- surpassing African Americans --- after new Census figures show the U.S. Latino population at 37.1 million. The number is expected to triple by the year 2050.

2004 The Minuteman Project begins to organize anti-immigrant activists at the U.S./Mexico border. The group considers itself a citizen's border patrol, but several known white supremacists are members. During the next two years, the Minuteman Project gains widespread press coverage. Immigrant rights supporters conduct counter-rallies in public opposition to the Minuteman Project's tactics and beliefs.

2005 Just as key provisions of the Voting Rights Act are about to expire, English-only conservatives oppose its renewal because of the expense of bilingual ballots. In August 2006, President George W. Bush will reauthorize the Act. The reauthorized Act will be named the "Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, and Cesar Chavez Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006."

2006 Immigrants -- mostly Latinos -- and their allies launch massive demonstrations in cities and towns across the country in support of immigrant rights and to protest the growing resentment toward undocumented workers.

2006 High school students, mostly but not exclusively Latino, stage walkouts in Los Angeles, Houston and other cities, boycotting schools and businesses in support of immigrant rights and equality. Schools issue suspensions and truancy reports to students who participate, and several students are arrested.

2006 On May 1, hundreds of thousands of Latino immigrants and others participate in the Day Without Immigrants, boycotting work, school and shopping, to symbolize the important contributions immigrants make to the American economy.

2006 The U.S. Congress debates legislation that would criminalize undocumented immigrants. Immigrant rights organizations support alternative legislation offering a pathway to citizenship. The legislation stalls, and Congress decides instead to hold hearings across the country during the summer and fall of 2006, to gain public input on how to handle the immigration issue.

Sources: National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, the Hispanic Heritage Plaza at HispanicOnline, PBS and A History of the Mexican-American People by Julian Samora and Patricia Vandel Simon.

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Latino Civil Rights Timeline, 1903 to 2006

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This piece is meant to be used with the following lessons: " Understanding the History of Latino Civil Rights" and " Exploring the History of Latino Civil Rights." When reading this timeline, it's important to remember that the fight for civil rights doesn't happen in a vacuum.

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Pew Research on Latino Sentiments - Hispanic Trends 

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Pew Research on Latino Sentiments - Hispanic Trends 

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Pew Research Center's Hispanic Trends Project

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During the first 18 months of the Donald Trump presidency, an increased number of Hispanics see a worsening situation for themselves and Hispanics overall, as well as an erosion of their optimism about the future financial well-being of their children. This is particularly true for foreign-born Latinos, especially those who are not U.S. citizens. Latino views of their place in America and their personal finances have also declined in recent years.

At the same time, however, a large majority of Hispanics say they are proud to be both Hispanic and American, and they continue to see the U.S. as a land with better opportunities than their country of origin. Among Hispanics born in other countries or Puerto Rico, a large majority would make the move to the mainland U.S. all over again, given the opportunity to do so.

More worry about their place in America, especially immigrants

Latinos are split about their place in America a year and a half into the Trump administration. About half (49%) say they have serious concerns about their place in America now that Donald Trump is president, while 46% say they are confident about their place in America.

The share of those concerned is up and the share who express confidence is down in 2018, compared with a survey taken in January 2017, before Trump took office. At that time, 41% of Latinos said they were concerned about their place in America while 54% said they were confident about it.

This growth in worry about their place in America is driven by a rise in concern among immigrants, those with no college education and independent voters who do not identify with or lean toward either the Republican or the Democratic parties.

In 2018, Latinos most concerned about their place in America are foreign born. Among immigrant Latinos, 57% say they are concerned, compared with 42% of those born in the U.S. Of the foreign born, those who are not U.S. citizens and do not hold a green card have the most concern, compared with Latino immigrants who are U.S. citizens and those who are lawful permanent residents.

There are also some differences by party affiliation and gender. Hispanic adults who identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party (57%) are significantly more likely to say they are concerned about their place in America than those who identify with or lean toward the Republican Party (26%). In addition, Hispanic women are more likely to express such concern (55%) than Hispanic men (43%).

In the past five years, the share of Hispanics who see the state of U.S. Hispanics worsening has grown dramatically and now rivals the negative views expressed in 2008, during the Great Recession.

Nearly half (47%) of Hispanics say the situation of U.S. Hispanics is worse than it was a year earlier, up sharply from 15% in 2013. This change in views is more dramatic among some groups of Hispanics: Democrats, women and those with at least a high school education.

In 2018, a majority (57%) of Hispanic Democrats say the situation of Hispanics in the U.S. has worsened in the past year, up from 12% who said the same in 2013. By contrast, the share of Hispanic Republicans who say Hispanics' situation has worsened is 28%, up moderately from 18% in 2013.

The views among Hispanic women about the situation of Hispanics in the U.S. have also grown sour in the past five years, more so than among Hispanic men, though such sentiment is up in both groups.

Life in the U.S. as a Latino

When it comes to living in the U.S., a majority (54%) says it has become more difficult to live in the country as a Latino in recent years, while 42% say things haven't changed much. Among the most likely to say that it has become more difficult for Latinos are those who are foreign born, those who are Spanish-dominant speakers and those who are not citizens. About two-thirds of each group says so.

For their part, Latino Democrats (61%) are twice as likely as Latino Republicans (30%) to say it has become more difficult to be Latino in the U.S. in recent years.

Latinos have grown pessimistic about their finances despite an improved national economy

The U.S. economy has improved in recent years, Latinos' household income is at a record high, unemployment among U.S. Latinos is at a record low and poverty levels among Latinos have dropped. Even so, Latino adults are more downbeat about their current financial situation today than they were three years ago, according to the new survey.

In 2015, 40% of Latinos said their personal financial situation was in "excellent" or "good" shape; today only 33% say the same. By contrast, assessments of personal finances are up among the general U.S. public.

The decrease in the share of Hispanics rating their personal finances as excellent or good in the past three years is greater among certain subgroups.

Hispanic men and women had similar ratings of their finances in 2015, but in 2018, women rated their situation lower. For their part, Hispanic young adults ages 18 to 29 used to rate their finances in a more positive light than older Hispanics three years ago (48% vs. 37%, respectively), but now their assessments resemble those of Hispanics ages 30 to 64 (33% vs. 32% respectively). From 2015 to 2018, positive financial ratings also fell among Hispanic Democrats but were stable for Hispanic Republicans.

But perhaps a more remarkable change is the grim forecast Latino adults paint when looking into their financial future. Today, about six-in-ten (62%) say they expect their personal financial situation to improve in the coming year, down 19 percentage points from three years ago (81%) and at the lowest level recorded since the Center first asked this question in 2004. Even during the Great Recession, when finances of Latinos were doing poorly, about two-thirds of Latinos expected their personal finances would improve the following year.

This turn in attitudes is more notable as Hispanics' views of their personal finances in the future have consistently been more positive than assessments among the general public. However, in 2018, members of the U.S. general public were more likely than Hispanics (68% vs. 62%) to say they expect their finances to improve in the coming year.

The drop in financial optimism observed in the past three years is larger among some subgroups of Latinos. They include immigrants and their U.S.-born children, those with lower levels of education and Democrats. By contrast, financial optimism remained mostly unchanged among Republican Latinos.

The downcast view of their own financial future extends to that of their children. Today only 54% of Latinos say they expect their children will be better off financially than themselves, a sharp reduction from 72% who said the same in 2015.

The reduction in optimism for the financial well-being of their children is larger among some Hispanics, especially those without college education, immigrants, those third generation or higher, naturalized U.S. citizens and women.

Financial optimism for their children declined more dramatically among immigrant Hispanics than their U.S.-born counterparts. For their part, U.S.-born Hispanics with U.S.-born parents had similar financial optimism as U.S.-born Hispanics with immigrant parents three years ago but now are markedly less optimistic. U.S.-born Hispanics with immigrant parents are also more optimistic today about their children's financial future than are Hispanic immigrants. Among foreign-born Hispanics, those who have become U.S. citizens had a sharper dive in optimism about their children's future (from 77% to 50%) than did non-citizens (from 74% to 55%). Among Hispanic women, optimism for intergenerational progress fell more dramatically between 2015 and 2018 than among Hispanic men, creating a gender gap on this question.

Hispanics are proud of their Hispanic identity - and proud to be American

Despite their pessimistic view of their current situation in the country and their diminished optimism about their children's future, large majorities of Hispanics in the U.S. express pride in their ethnic and national identities, and still see the U.S. as a place with better opportunities than their countries of origin. Fully 97% agree with the statement, "I am proud to be Hispanic." And 84% say they completely or mostly agree with the statement, "I am proud to be an American." The survey also finds that 82% agree with both statements, saying they are proud to be Hispanic and proud to be American.

Their pride in being American varies across some demographic groups, even though large majorities express this. Ties to the U.S. matter when it comes to expressing pride in being American: U.S.-born Hispanics are more likely than the foreign born to say they are proud of being American (91% vs. 77%). Among immigrant Latinos, those who are U.S. citizens (93%) are just as likely as the U.S. born to say they are proud of their adopted nationality, while those who have a green card (72%) are more likely to express pride in being American than those who are neither citizens nor permanent residents (61%).

Although most Latinos say that life in the U.S. has become harder for Latinos, seven-in-ten immigrant Latinos or those who moved to the U.S. from Puerto Rico say that, given the opportunity, they would come to the U.S. again, while 17% say they would stay in their home country or Puerto Rico, and 11% say they would move to a different country.

Compared with 2011, when the question was last asked, the share who say they would come to the U.S. again is down, while the share saying they would move to a different country is up.

When asked to assess how the U.S. compares with their country of origin, 85% of Hispanics say the opportunity to get ahead is better in the U.S., with similar shares among those who immigrated to the U.S. and those who were born here. Similarly, about three-in-four (74%) Hispanics say the conditions for raising children are better in the U.S. than they are in their country of origin. In both instances, opinions are unchanged since 2011 when the question was last asked.

Puerto Ricans have less positive views of the U.S. than do Hispanics from other origins. Those who moved to the U.S. from Puerto Rico are less likely than Hispanics who migrated from another country to say they would move again if given the opportunity (54% vs. 71%). Three-in-four Puerto Ricans (74%) say the opportunity to get ahead is better in the U.S. than in the U.S. territory, compared with 86% of Hispanics who are not Puerto Rican. Similarly, 54% of Puerto Ricans believe the U.S. has better conditions for raising children, compared with 76% of Hispanics of other origins.

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Latinos now more negative about their place in America

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During the first 18 months of the Donald Trump presidency, an increased number of Hispanics see a worsening situation for themselves and Hispanics overall, as well as an erosion of their optimism about the future financial well-being of their children.

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This story appears in the July 2018 issue ofNational Geographic magazine.

Ismael Fernandez grew up in Wilder, Idaho, a town of 1,700 souls surrounded by tall hop plants and stubby alfalfa fields.

He lived with his grandparents in a home built on land where his grandfather, a Vietnam War veteran, once picked beets and onions.

When Fernandez was 19, he was elected to the city council. On his first day in office, in 2015, he stepped up to the short dais in Wilder City Hall and sat alongside the four other council members. A local reporter noticed something no one else had: There were five Spanish surnames on the council members' nameplates. Almazan. Rivera. Godina. Garcia. Fernandez. The story soon went national. For the first time ever in Idaho-a state where non-Hispanic whites make up 82 percent of the population-voters had elected an all-Latino city council.

Born in 1996 to farmworkers with roots in Mexico, Fernandez grew up hearing people describe him as Latino. The term spread in the last decades of the 20th century as a means of grouping together ethnically diverse peoples of Hispanic heritage: immigrants from Cuba and Guatemala, U.S.-born citizens with roots in Puerto Rico and Peru, and many others.

"Wilder is a small town, and it's a sleepy town," Fernandez explained to some of the out-of-town reporters who visited. "Early in the morning and late in the evening, no matter what direction you go ... north, south, west, east, you're going to see fields and ... people working. Mainly Latino, mainly of Mexican descent."

Wilder, where Latinos now make up three-quarters of the population, has become an unlikely symbol of the rising influence of Latinos nationwide.

Every day the rest of the United States becomes a little more like Wilder. The nation's Latino population has grown sixfold since 1970, reaching an estimated 57.4 million in 2016, or nearly 18 percent of the population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In most places where the locals say a community "feels" different from what it did a generation ago, Latinos are the reason: They account for more of the nation's demographic changes than any other group.

Because of this increase, the United States will become a "minority majority" country by the middle of this century. This dramatic reordering of the nation's demographics has spawned anger and conflict, which some opportunistic politicians and media commentators have helped fuel by portraying whites as victims in an increasingly diverse United States. Such critics, including President Donald Trump, often have cast Latinos as violent gang members, job stealers uninterested in learning English, and undocumented immigrants who come to the United States and have so-called anchor babies, children who are U.S. citizens at birth. Resentment about immigration-most of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. are Latinos-helped fuel the political shifts that sent Trump to the White House.

Most Latino people in Wilder will tell you they've always gotten along well with their white neighbors. Things haven't changed much since Trump was elected in 2016, they say. People with roots in Mexico are appreciated here because the farm economy couldn't exist without them.

"This has always been known as the Mexican town," Adrián González, 40, told me from the front yard of his Wilder home, a block from a field where hop vines rise on V-shaped trellises. He was born in Texas, grew up speaking Spanish at home and English at school, and came to Idaho to join Mexican-American relatives working in the fields: "We topped onions, detasseled corn, blocked sugar beets."

A similar need for laborers is reshaping the demographics and culture of rural areas nationwide. And big cities such as Miami, New York, Houston, Chicago, and Los Angeles are now home to millions of Latinos who reflect a broad economic spectrum and, as in Wilder, are taking on leadership roles in their communities.

I grew up as the son of Guatemalan immigrants in Los Angeles, which now has a Latino plurality. Like people in Wilder, L.A. residents of Latino descent pepper Spanish into their speech, even if English is their native tongue. They make comfort food from beans and corn masa; they go to church to praise Dios, and they call their daughters mija (a portmanteau of mi hija, my daughter).

Latinos in Los Angeles vote too, electing pro-immigrant representatives and helping make California (a state that once elected Ronald Reagan governor) among the most pro-Democrat of the 50 states. The mayor of Los Angeles and key leaders in the state legislature are of Latin American descent.

Over the decades I've seen traditions such as Cinco de Mayo spread across the country to heartland towns such as Garden City, Kansas; Lexington, Nebraska; and Wilder, Idaho.

The city council in Wilder meets in a former bank that serves as city hall. Members say they rarely, if ever, discuss questions of cultural identity.

"People ask me, 'As a Hispanic, how are you going to help Hispanics?'" says Mayor Alicia Almazan, a hair stylist who grew up working alongside her father in Idaho fields. "This is not what we're about." Her mission, she explains, is to help all of Wilder's residents.

At the same time, the mayor is proud of her heritage. Her Spanish-speaking father taught her "to stand up for yourself no matter what ... and never back down." She repeats a phrase he'd say in Spanish: "Nunca se va a rajar, ninguno de mis hijos." None of my kids will ever break.

Like other places in the United States, western Idaho is a cultural crossroads. Spanish-surnamed people first came from Mexico and South Texas to live in Wilder in large numbers during the second half of the 20th century. They were following annual migrant-worker routes, and each year most would leave once the snow began to fall. When a few decided to stay, the local Latino community was born.

"We were very cold-in a trailer, without heat, and with a baby boy," Alejandro Bravo, 40, says of his family's first winters in Wilder. Bravo works full-time for a local farmer during the week. On the weekends he's a pastor who leads a Spanish-language service in Wilder's Methodist church. The lessons he's learned on his journey to Idaho from Guadalajara, Mexico, are reflected in his sermons. "Sufrimos, batallamos," he says. We suffered, we battled.

Among the major ethnic or racial identities in the United States-white, black, Asian, Native American-Latino is the most amorphous. Latino people can be African, Mesoamerican, Asian, or white. They are evangelical, Roman Catholic, and Jewish. I am of Maya Indian heritage, but like many Latino people over 50, I have "white" listed as my race on my birth certificate.

What "Latino" means, more than anything, is that you are part of a story that links you to other people with roots in a southern place: Ecuador or El Salvador, for example. Or maybe an old Southwestern town founded by Spaniards, such as Española, New Mexico. More than likely this story involves the journey a migrant made in search of work and opportunity.

In Los Angeles, the great sprawling metropolis centered on what was once an outpost of the Spanish Empire, Latino people still think of labor, migration, hardship, and resilience as the qualities that define them and tie them together.

I grew up with my parents' stories of their journey from Guatemala to the one-room apartment in Los Angeles, where I was born and raised. We slowly rose into the middle class, moving eastward every few years-from crowded East Hollywood to newer, roomier suburbs such as Whittier.

Countless Latino residents of Greater Los Angeles followed in my family's footsteps. Once confined to barrios in East L.A. and Boyle Heights, Latino communities have spread to almost every corner of the metropolis.

At the southern end of Los Angeles, in the oil-refinery and port community of Wilmington, I met the family of Luz Gomez. Three languages are spoken at the Gomez home: English, Spanish, and Zapotec. Luz, 17, is a U.S. citizen who's grown up following Zapotec Indian traditions. At celebrations in Los Angeles, she dons the woven skirt and blouse worn by women in her parents' hometown-San Bartolomé Quialana, in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, a place she first visited this year. "When people say 'Latino,' they think 'Mexican,'" Luz told me. "I call myself Oaxacan."

Her father, Fidel, came to the U.S. as a teen. When his first American daughter was born, he gave her two names: Luz, which is Spanish for "light," and Zithviani, Zapotec for "far away." "So my name means 'light from far away,'" she says. And each fall Luz's mother, Lola, marks the Day of the Dead, el Día de los Muertos, with traditions of her Oaxacan ancestors: cooking special dishes and building an altar in the living room with marigolds, votive candles, and photos of the departed.

In southern California el Día de los Muertos is a modern symbol of Latinidad, or Latino-ness, for millions of people. Many are lifelong Americans like me who grew up speaking English.

In Whittier fifth-grade teacher Yolanda Garcia noticed her students did better when their lessons had Latino themes. Learning about their culture and history made them feel smarter. She sensed that this hunger for Latino culture had commercial potential too-so she started a store, Casita del Pueblo, in Whittier's Uptown in 2004.

Later, with the blessing of Whittier officials, Garcia launched a Day of the Dead festival in a nearby park. The festival now takes up a dozen city blocks on an October weekend.

Whittier has become a mecca of the Latino middle class, a transformation few locals could have imagined a generation ago. I grew up in South Whittier-an unincorporated, down-market community nearby-and knew Whittier as a place where white people lived. Richard Nixon went to high school there.

These days some very affluent Latino families live in Whittier, including Richard and Rebecca Zapanta. Their 12,000-square-foot home in the city's Beverly Hills Estates resembles an Italian villa. They've filled it with paintings and other works by many of Mexico's master artists, including Rafael Coronel and Frida Kahlo.

Richard grew up in the barrios of East Los Angeles in the 1950s and 1960s, but he had no real, living connection to Mexico. "I'm fourth-generation Mexican American," he told me. After he became a successful surgeon, he traveled to the land of his ancestors again and again. His Spanish improved, a skill that was useful when he met Mexican artists.

The Zapanta home is also filled with photographs of Latino politicians they know, many of whom have risen to national prominence. Among them: Antonio Villaraigosa, who was Los Angeles's mayor for two terms, and Hilda Solis, a former U.S. congresswoman who was labor secretary during President Barack Obama's second term.

When Rebecca was first dating Richard, she says, "We started off with $10, eating menudo at Ciro's," a humble Eastside eatery. Before Obama left office, Secretary Solis invited Rebecca to a state dinner at the White House.

In the Latino communities of Southern California, it is the best of times, and the most difficult.

I live in a hillside home with beautiful views near the Los Angeles River, where the real estate boom has pushed the value of some properties past one million dollars. A short downhill walk from my home, undocumented immigrants live and work.

In February 2017, less than a mile from my neighborhood, Romulo Avelica-Gonzalez was driving his U.S.-born daughter Fatima to school when immigration agents suddenly descended upon the family. Her mother told Fatima, then 13, to record the arrest on her cell phone. "I was sad, and at the same time I was mad, because they were taking my dad away from me," she told me.

The Avelicas have roots in a seaside town in the Mexican state of Nayarit, but they've lived in Los Angeles for a quarter century. For months after Romulo's arrest, Fatima and her family visited him in an immigration facility. In the meantime the video she'd shot of her father's arrest had gone viral. "Now people know what the president is doing," she says, referring to the Trump administration's aggressive deportation policies. "He's tearing families apart because he thinks they're criminals."

Romulo was released from detention six months later. He returned to the Eastside and made tacos for the friends and strangers who'd fought for his release and had won-thanks in large measure to Fatima's video.

Romulo has lived in the U.S. long enough to have grandchildren born in America. With plans to revamp the nation's immigration system stalled in Congress, the presence of millions of undocumented Latino men and women is becoming a permanent feature of American life; they are now as much a part of the nation's social fabric as softball and summer camp. But the ever stricter enforcement of immigration laws has changed the feel of daily life in many Latino communities. The impact is seen most dramatically along the 1,900-mile U.S.-Mexico border.

The slow river that separates Mexico from the United States is a mirror of calm water less than 100 yards wide when it passes the quiet border town of El Cenizo, Texas-population 3,300. If Trump's proposed border wall were built here, it would run past a city playground near the riverbank and the open field where Fermín Longoria stopped recently to feed his brother's horses.

"I don't think that wall will ever be put here," Longoria told me in Spanish.

El Cenizo is 99 percent Latino. People of Mexican descent have long lived here and crossed easily back and forth between the two countries. In 1999 the city passed a sanctuary law protecting undocumented immigrants. "Two Cultures, One Great City" is El Cenizo's motto. The local school is named for two heroes, one U.S.-born and one Mexican: Kennedy-Zapata Elementary.

El Cenizo gets its name from a sagebrush that grows along the Rio Grande Valley. People here used to work on the onion and melon farms nearby, but those crops were abandoned years ago, forcing many to travel hundreds of miles in search of jobs. And yet many residents remain proud to call the mostly Spanish-speaking town home. "You never have to lock your doors here," Salomon Torres-Martínez, 63, told me. He built a home in El Cenizo from scratch, assembling materials gradually, "like a bird building a nest."

When immigrants pass by his house after crossing the river on rafts, Torres-Martínez responds the way most other El Cenizo residents do: He looks the other way.

In recent years tougher enforcement has made immigrant smugglers a more dangerous, desperate breed. "Now they're starting to carry guns," resident Carlos Coronado told me. An increased U.S. Border Patrol presence also has frightened many in El Cenizo: Mayor Raul Reyes estimates one in five residents may be undocumented.

In 2017 Reyes filed suit to stop enforcement of a new Texas law that would force local police to cooperate with immigration authorities. Reyes, a registered Democrat, announced he would be willing to take the fight all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Reyes first ran for office in El Cenizo at age 19-just like Ismael Fernandez, the young city councilman in Wilder, Idaho, except Fernandez ran as a Republican.

Growing up in rural Idaho, Fernandez once told his grandmother that he might be the first Latino president. It didn't seem impossible, given how driven he was. He often engaged in political debates with his more liberal older sister, Mariza. "I want to change people's minds by doing stuff," he told her.

He studied practical things such as sewer and water systems. A state legislator appointed him her alternate; he was empowered to cast votes when she was absent from the Capitol in nearby Boise. It was a great honor for a 20-year-old, and more seemed sure to follow. But just days after the appointment, on January 27, 2017, Ismael Fernandez died in a car accident outside Wilder. His sister and grandmother chose a small obelisk as his grave marker-it reminded them of the Washington Monument. "You know he would love that," his sister says. Young Ismael had been a history buff who put a framed copy of the U.S. Constitution on his bedroom wall. "I want to be talked about for ages to come," he once told her. "I want to leave something behind."

Today that obelisk stands as a monument to a local hero of the Latino community: a young man who went to city hall to make his hometown a better place to live and who believed a Latino family with roots in Mexico could leave a permanent mark on the United States of America.

Héctor Tobar is a veteran journalist and the author of four books. PhotographersKarla Gachet andIvan Kashinsky have worked throughout the Americas. All three are based in Los Angeles.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to reflect the fact that Senator Toni Atkins replaced Senator Kevin de León as President pro Tempore of the California State Senate on March 21, 2018.

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How Latinos Are Shaping America's Future

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This story appears in the July 2018 issue ofNational Geographic magazine. Ismael Fernandez grew up in Wilder, Idaho, a town of 1,700 souls surrounded by tall hop plants and stubby alfalfa fields. He lived with his grandparents in a home built on land where his grandfather, a Vietnam War veteran, once picked beets and onions.