When Minnesota was a new state, thousands of settlers arrived, many of them from Europe. But in recent decades, the state has attracted large numbers of Hmong and Somali refugees. There are also thousands of people from India, Ethiopia, the Philippines, Mexico and the People’s Republic of China living in Minnesota.
The state has become more racially diverse in the last 10 years, and demographers said that's especially true among children. About 83 percent of Minnesotans were white, non-Hispanic for the 2010 census, compared to 88 percent in 2000.
November 14, 2001 - Since September 11-th, the U.S. economy has weakened. Layoffs and job cutbacks hit Hispanic workers especially hard. That's because so many immigrants work in the industries most affected -- food service, hotels and airports. The Hispanic population has been growing dramatically in Minnesota. But with layoffs and other scares like anthrax, some Hispanic immigrants are going home. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Stucky teamed with a reporter form the newspaper El Norte in Monterrey, Mexico and filed this report. __________________
November 16, 2001 - “The Color of Justice: The News Disparities” is part five of an MPR special series which investigates the racial disparity in Minnesota’s criminal justice system. Discussions of race and the criminal justice system tend to focus on the disproportionate rates at which African Americans are arrested and jailed. However, the growth of Latinos, Hmong, and Somali in Minnesota has broadened the scope of the disparities issue.
November 20, 2001 -
November 26, 2001 - MPR’s Jeff Horwich presents a Mainstreet Radio series looking at the growing role of Spanish in the Minnesota work place. The series begins in Cold Spring, along conveyor lines of butchered chickens.
November 27, 2001 - MPR’s Jeff Horwich presents a Mainstreet Radio series looking at the growing role of Spanish in the Minnesota work place. The series continues with report on one large Minnesota company finding biligual workers are good for the bottom line.
November 28, 2001 -
November 28, 2001 - MPR’s Jeff Horwich presents a Mainstreet Radio series looking at the growing role of Spanish in the Minnesota work place. Horwich spent an evening with one rural Minnesota police officer helping his department relate to the town's changing population.
December 5, 2001 - The FBI has begun interviewing men between the ages of 18 and 33 who have recently emmigrated from countries the U.S. suspects of links to terrorism. Nationwide, they'll interview five-thousand people. Minnesota's Somali community, the largest in the nation, includes many young and recent immigrants. It's also the state's largest Muslim population. Somali leaders worry their community could be targeted for questioning--and they see it as one sign of troubling changes in the legal system of their adopted country. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Losure reports.
December 13, 2001 - U.S. Attorney Tom Heffelfinger met with a group of recent Somali immigrants yesterday (Wednesday) to attempt to allay some of their fears about questioning by the FBI. Last month, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft asked law enforcement around the nation to help locate and interview five-thousand men from the Middle East and countries where al-Qaida terrorists are known to operate. Minnesota Public Radio's Elizabeth Stawicki reports:
December 20, 2001 - Mainstreet Radios Bob Reha reports on 40 of Sudan's “Lost Boys” that now call Fargo home. They are refugees from years of civil war plaguing their North African country. An estimated two million people have died in the conflict. The Fargo Lost Boys trekked from Sudan through Ethiopia to Kenya. They now are facing the challenges of adapting to a new culture, all while dreaming of returning home.