EthnicMajority

(ABA Journal) Last fall, Christopher W. Quinn II offered a free consultation to 10,000 subscribers of the Michigan Chronicle, an African-American newspaper, as a way of advertising his Detroit-based solo practice specializing in business and real estate law, and criminal defense.

Dale Minami of Minami Tamaki in San Francisco sent 250 CDs of the Japanese-American jazz band Hiroshima to clients and former clients as a holiday gift last year. The firm of 15 lawyers also distributed pedestrian-safety fliers in English and Japanese through organizations in Japantown as one way to stay connected to the Asian-Americans who make up 50 percent of his firm’s client base. Minami, who handles personal injury cases, came up with the idea after he had his 10th case representing an injured pedestrian.

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(FoxNews) A number of groups hope to add thousands of new U.S. citizens to the voter rolls in several key states ahead of November's presidential election.

The national push comes after Democratic President Barack Obama has failed to deliver on promised immigration reforms in his first years in office and his likely opponent, Mitt Romney, adopted harsh rhetoric on illegal immigration to win support from conservatives while campaigning for the GOP nomination.

The Department of Homeland Security says an estimated 12.6 million people were holding so-called green cards given to legal permanent U.S. residents in 2010, including 8.1 million people who already qualify for naturalization but have not applied for citizenship. Latinos, considered a Democratic-leaning constituency, account for the largest immigrant community.

(Examiner.com) Statistics show a deep divide in opinions along racial lines regarding the killing of a black Florida teenager, Trayvon Martin, by George Zimmerman, who is of mixed ethnicity, white and Hispanic.

Zimmerman has claimed self-defense, invoking the Sunshine State’s “Stand Your Ground” law which has also come under intense scrutiny in the wake of the incident.

Reuters news service reported last week, 91% of blacks believe Martin was unjustly killed, while only 35% of whites concurred. Hispanics were in between at 59% according to polling numbers Reuters gathered by querying nearly 2,000 Americans.

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(McClatchy) Mitt Romney has a problem with Hispanics.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee trails Democratic President Barack Obama among Hispanic voters by a margin of better than 2-1, a deficit large enough to cost him the presidency as it did John McCain four years ago.

Some of his problem comes with the Republican brand, some through his own tough talk on illegal immigration during the Republican primaries. Either way, Romney has to find a way to close the gap or lose. Among the options: a conservative version of immigration reform, an Hispanic running mate, and plenty of grassroots courting.

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(Nielsen Wire) In the U.S., Hispanic consumers’ usage rates of smartphones, television, online video, social networking and other forms of entertainment make this group one of today’s most engaged and dynamic populations in the digital space, according to Nielsen’s recent State of the Hispanic Consumer: The Hispanic Market Imperative report.  Mobile presents a significant avenue of opportunity for marketers looking to reach Hispanic consumers – Hispanic mobile users send or receive 941 SMS (text) messages a month, more than any other ethnic group.  They also make 13 phone calls per day, 40 percent more than the average U.S. mobile user.

Social is another platform where Latinos are especially active and rising in numbers.  During February 2012, Hispanics increased their visits to Social Networks/Blogs by 14 percent compared to February 2011.  Not only are Latinos the fastest growing U.S. ethnic group on Facebook and WordPress.com from a year ago, but also Hispanic adults are 25 percent more likely to follow a brand and 18 percent more likely to follow a celebrity than the general online population.

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(Citizen of the Month) There are quite a few articles today about a controversy revolving around the new Lena Dunham- created HBO show, Girls, and the lack of diversity in the cast, particular with African-American characters.  One of the reasons for the outcry over this show rather than the countless other all-white shows is that critics have been wetting their pants over the show, calling it the VOICE of the twenty-something generation of women.

Whenever something is crowned “the voice of a generation,” those who don’t fit into the demographic always feel left out.  We should retire that expression.

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(PBS) GWEN IFILL: Along the campaign trail, Democrats and Republicans take note of the census numbers and plot a new path to victory.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Soy Barack Obama y apruebo este mensaje.

GWEN IFILL: It's not a coincidence that President Obama has begun speaking Spanish. As the general election campaign takes shape, Democrats and Republican Mitt Romney are competing for the support of the nation's fastest growing demographic group, Latino voters.

The NewsHour's Vote 2012 Map Center found, in 2008, Hispanics represented large percentages of voters across the Southwest and Florida. But the map is much bigger than that. Both campaigns are competing heatedly in at least three critical swing states: Nevada, Colorado, and Florida.

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(Miami Herald) The U.S. Hispanic population is young, mobile, growing and has skyrocketing spending power, making the segment highly desirable for marketers, a report released Tuesday by Nielsen reveals.

Already at 52 million — and projected to represent the bulk of population growth during the next five years, Hispanics are undoubtedly a vital part of the American economy, impacting everything from popular culture to politics and consumerism.

Indeed, the group’s buying power reached $1 trillion in 2010 and is expected to grow 50 percent by 2015, hitting $1.5 trillion, according to Nielsen’s report, “State of the Hispanic Consumer: The Hispanic Market Imperative.”

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Youths from African American, Native American, and Latino backgrounds are underrepresented in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math (known as STEM subjects). Although having a mentor of the same ethnicity is widely seen as one way to engage these youths in STEM subjects, no study has asked these young people if they consider having a mentor who shares their background to be important. Now a new study of African American and Latino youths has found that having a "matched" mentor does matter, but only if having such a mentor is considered important by the adolescent.

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(Los Angeles Times) One of two suspects charged with murder and hate crimes on allegations of shooting five black Tulsa residents, three fatally, insists in a newly released jail video that he’s not racist, as does his mother.

Jacob England, 19, appears in the video wearing a black-and-white-striped jail uniform, standing in a stark room, his hair shaved on the sides into what looks like a Mohawk. He talks about growing up in North Tulsa, home to a large African American community, saying he had friends of various races.

"I always got along with everybody," England says in the video, which his lawyer told The Times was recorded at Tulsa Jail by his defense team Friday morning. "It didn't matter what color he was."

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