U.S. minorities top 100 million

WASHINGTON, May 17 (UPI) -- The "minority" population of the United States has topped the 100 million mark, the U.S. Census Bureau said Thursday.

A bureau release stated that about a third of the U.S population is a member of a minority group. The total U.S. minority population of 100.7 million is larger than the total population of all but 11 countries.

Some 20.7 million minorities live in California and 12.2 million reside in Texas, the Census Bureau said.

Hispanics make up the largest minority group, totaling some 44.3 million U.S. residents on July 1, 2006. There are some 40.2 million blacks and 14.9 million Asians in the United States. The Census Bureau said the population of American Indians and Alaska Natives totaled 4.5 million while the Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander count was 1 million.

The U.S. population of non-Hispanic whites who indicated no other race totaled 198.7 million in 2006.

Four states -- California (57 percent minority), Hawaii (75 percent), New Mexico (57 percent) and Texas (52 percent) -- and the District of Columbia (68 percent) are "majority-minority."