The U.S. Census classifies Hispanic and Latino Americans by asking people to identify themselves, and for the past four decades it has treated “Hispanic or Latino” as an ethnicity separate from race — meaning respondents are asked their Hispanic origin in one question and their race in another. That framework is now changing. A 2024 federal standards revision would fold the two questions into one and make “Hispanic or Latino” a co-equal category alongside White, Black, Asian, and others, though the Trump administration is reviewing whether to keep the change before it reaches the 2030 count.
Ethnicity, Not Race: The Framework Through 2020
In 1977, the Office of Management and Budget issued Statistical Policy Directive No. 15, which set minimum standards for how federal agencies collect data on race and ethnicity. The directive stated it was “preferable to collect data on race and ethnicity separately,” and it created two ethnic options: “Hispanic origin” and “Not of Hispanic Origin.”1UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute. Latino Is Not a Race Every decennial census from 1980 through 2020 followed that structure.
In practice, this means a Hispanic respondent is asked two questions. The first: Are you of Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin? The second: What is your race? The available racial categories are White, Black or African American, American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, and “some other race.” Hispanic identity is treated as a cultural or ancestral trait that cuts across racial lines, so a Hispanic person is expected to also pick a race.
How the Question Got There
The census first singled out a Latin American-origin group in 1930, when “Mexican” appeared as a racial category. That was dropped by 1940, and for three decades the Bureau relied on indirect proxies like Spanish surnames, language spoken at home, and birthplace in a Spanish-speaking country.1UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute. Latino Is Not a Race
The 1970 census introduced a self-reported Hispanic origin question on the long form sent to about five percent of households, with categories for Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South American, and Other Spanish.2Pew Research Center. Census History: Counting Hispanics In 1976, Congress passed Public Law 94-311, which President Gerald Ford signed on June 16 of that year. The law directed federal statistical agencies to develop better data on “Americans of Spanish origin or descent,” specifically naming Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans, and Cuban Americans.3The American Presidency Project. Remarks Upon Signing Legislation Relating to the Publication of Spanish American Economic and Social Statistics OMB’s 1977 directive followed a year later.
The 1980 census moved the Hispanic origin question to the short form so every household received it. The word “Latino” was added in 2000, and the question was placed before the race question. In 2010, the wording became “Is this person of Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin?” with examples of specific nationalities.2Pew Research Center. Census History: Counting Hispanics
The “Some Other Race” Problem
The ethnicity-plus-race framework has never worked cleanly, because many Hispanic respondents do not see their identity fitting any of the racial categories offered. In the 2000 census, 42 percent of Hispanics selected “some other race,” often writing in a nationality or the word “Hispanic” itself. Only 0.2 percent of non-Hispanics chose that option.4Pew Hispanic Center. Shades of Belonging
By 2020, about 26 million Latinos identified exclusively as “some other race,” and 45 million chose it either alone or with another category. That made “some other race” the country’s second-largest racial group.5NPR. 2020 Census Results by Race A Census Bureau working paper found that 43.6 percent of the self-reported Hispanic population either did not answer the race question or reported “some other race” alone.6U.S. Census Bureau. Hispanic or Latino Population Race Reporting
Sociologist G. Cristina Mora and other researchers have argued that the “some other race” catchall obscures real racial identities within the Latino population, making it harder to track health disparities, mortality, and discrimination.5NPR. 2020 Census Results by Race Because most other federal agencies don’t offer a “some other race” option, the Census Bureau has acknowledged the practice creates “noncomparability” across government datasets.
Not all Hispanic respondents pick “some other race.” A 2004 Pew analysis of census data found that Hispanics who identified as White had higher levels of education, income, and civic engagement than those who chose “some other race.” Foreign-born Latinos were more likely to select “some other race” (46 percent) than the U.S.-born (40 percent), and geography mattered: 63 percent of native-born Mexican Americans in Texas identified as White, versus 45 percent of those living elsewhere.4Pew Hispanic Center. Shades of Belonging
The 2024 Overhaul: One Question, Seven Categories
On March 28, 2024, OMB published its first revision to Directive No. 15 since 1997. The update eliminates the two-question format and replaces it with a single combined question: “What is your race and/or ethnicity? Select all that apply.”7OMB SPD 15 Revision. 2024 SPD 15
Under the new standards, “Hispanic or Latino” becomes one of seven minimum categories, alongside White, Black or African American, Asian, American Indian or Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, and a newly created Middle Eastern or North African category.8U.S. Department of Education. SPD 15 The revision explicitly bars agencies from labeling some categories as “ethnicities” and others as “races” — all seven are treated co-equally.9U.S. Census Bureau. Standards Updates Agencies must also collect detailed data beyond the minimum categories unless they secure an exemption.10OMB SPD 15 Revision. Question Format
Proponents point to a decade of Census Bureau research showing the combined question produces more accurate data, largely because it should sharply reduce reliance on “some other race.”9U.S. Census Bureau. Standards Updates The Bureau had planned to debut the combined question in the 2027 American Community Survey and the 2030 decennial census.
Criticism From Afro-Latino Groups
A coalition of more than 35 Afro-Latine organizations and over 100 scholars, supported by a “Latino is Not a Race” campaign launched in February 2023, has opposed collapsing race and ethnicity into one question. Their concern is that a person who identifies as both Black and Latino, presented with a single list, may check only “Hispanic or Latino” and disappear from the data as a Black person.1UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute. Latino Is Not a Race
OMB acknowledged the risk in its 2024 rulemaking. Cognitive interviews found that about half of participants who identified as both Hispanic and Black during recruitment selected only the “Hispanic or Latino” category when given the combined question. At the same time, the Census Bureau’s 2015 National Content Test, which sampled 1.2 million housing units, found “no significant difference” in Afro-Latino population estimates between the combined and separate formats.11Federal Register. Revisions to OMB SPD No. 15 OMB said it would prioritize further research on how to encourage Afro-Latino respondents to select multiple categories.
The UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute has separately proposed adding a “street race” question that would ask respondents what race a stranger would assume them to be based on physical appearance, arguing that self-identification alone misses the discrimination Latinos experience based on how they look.1UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute. Latino Is Not a Race
Who the Census Does Not Count as Hispanic
The federal definition ties “Hispanic or Latino” to Spanish culture or origin, which means Brazilians are excluded. The Census Bureau classifies people who write in “Brazilian” as White and not Hispanic.1UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute. Latino Is Not a Race
A 2020 processing error briefly reversed that. The Bureau accidentally failed to apply its “back coding” procedure, which reclassifies people who check “Hispanic” but write in a non-Hispanic origin. As a result, at least 416,000 Brazilians were counted as Hispanic in 2020, compared with 14,000 in 2019 and 16,000 in 2021. If counted as a distinct Latino group that year, they would have been the 14th largest.12Pew Research Center. How a Coding Error Provided a Rare Glimpse Into Latino Identity Among Brazilians Before back coding began in 2000, roughly a third of Brazilians had been counted as Hispanic.
How People Actually Identify
The classification depends on self-identification, and self-identification varies. Pew Research Center surveys find that 42 percent of Hispanics say being Hispanic is mainly about culture, 29 percent say ancestry, and 17 percent say race.13Pew Research Center. Who Is Hispanic
Identity also fades over generations. Among immigrants from Latin America, 97 percent identify as Hispanic. In the second generation the share is 92 percent. By the fourth generation and beyond, only about half of people with Hispanic ancestry still identify as Hispanic. Of those who do not, 81 percent say they have simply never thought of themselves that way.14Pew Research Center. Hispanic Identity Fades Across Generations
Why the Classification Matters
Hispanic classification drives the distribution of federal money and the drawing of political districts. The decennial count determines the apportionment of all 435 U.S. House seats among the states and is used to redraw congressional, state legislative, and local district lines.15MALDEF. Redistricting Under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, plans that dilute minority voting strength are unlawful, and census data on race and ethnicity is the primary evidence courts use to evaluate compliance.
The 1975 amendments to the VRA, enacted after lobbying by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, extended the Act’s protections to “language minority” groups, including Hispanics.16National Affairs. Redistricting, Race, and the Voting Rights Act Census counts have supported the creation of majority-minority districts, particularly in Texas and Florida, where Hispanic growth has been sufficient to justify new districts at the congressional level.17Cambridge University Press. Counting Those Who Count
Undercounts translate directly into lost dollars. The Census Bureau’s Post-Enumeration Survey found the Hispanic population was undercounted by 4.99 percent in 2020, more than triple the 1.54 percent undercount in 2010.18National Academies of Sciences. Assessing the 2020 Census: Final Report Child Trends estimated that the 2020 Hispanic undercount could cost states between $930 million and $3.7 billion annually in Medicaid funding for children alone, with 37 states identified as vulnerable across programs including CHIP, foster care, and child care block grants.19Child Trends. Undercounting Hispanics in the 2020 Census
What Happens Before 2030
The 2024 combined-question standard is not yet locked in. In September 2025, OMB extended the deadline for federal agencies to submit implementation plans, and in December 2025, White House chief statistician Mark Calabria confirmed the Trump administration had begun reviewing the 2024 revisions and the process by which they were approved, with officials signaling a potential rollback.20NPR. Trump Census Race Categories OMB later extended the implementation deadline again, to March 28, 2027.21Cato Institute. President Trump Can Stop Racial Profiling Immediately
The administration also overhauled the 2026 operational test, a rehearsal for the 2030 census. The original plan called for six test sites with bilingual paper questionnaires and phone response options. The revised plan cut the test to two sites (Huntsville, Alabama, and Spartanburg, South Carolina), limited self-response to online-only in English, replaced the census short form with the American Community Survey questionnaire, and launched a pilot using postal workers as enumerators.22U.S. Census Bureau. 2026 Census Test Updates Sixty-six members of Congress submitted a formal letter opposing the changes, arguing they would chill participation among immigrant and Latino families.23CAPAC. Congressional Leaders Sound Alarm on Proposed Census Changes
As of mid-2026, the Census Bureau’s planning documents still list the combined race and ethnicity question for use in the 2027 ACS and the 2030 census, but the administration’s review remains open with no final determination announced.21Cato Institute. President Trump Can Stop Racial Profiling Immediately Until then, the ethnicity-plus-race framework in place since 1980 remains the operative standard.