The U.S. state of New Jersey is home to significant and growing numbers of people of Hispanic and Latino descent, who in 2018 represented a Census-estimated 20.4% of the state's total population (nearly 1.8 million).[1][2] New Jersey's Latino population comprises substantial concentrations of Dominican Americans, Puerto Rican Americans, Cuban Americans, Mexican Americans, Central Americans, Peruvian Americans, Colombian Americans, and Ecuadorian Americans.[2] New Jersey is also home to a large Brazilian American and Portuguese-speaking population.[3]
The state has multiple municipalities with Hispanic-majority populations.[4] Latinos and Hispanics form one-third of the population in the largest city, Newark settling in the Forest Hill, Broadway and Mount Pleasant neighborhoods which comprise mostly of Puerto Ricans and Dominicans. The northern part of Hudson County has been nicknamed Havana on the Hudson for the large number of Cuban exiles and émigrés living there. Little Lima, in Paterson, is the largest Peruvian enclave outside of South America.
Many Latino and Hispanic people have been elected to public office in New Jersey, at both the state and local levels.