When comedian Stephen Colbert interviewed then-Congressman Jason Chaffetz about Utah, he intoned “according to my research, Utah’s 3rd District is one of the most diverse districts in the state. Tell me about your Black person. Is he nice?”
Chaffetz laughed and responded “we have a much more diverse population than we get credit for.”
Both Chaffetz and Colbert had points. Utah’s ethnic diversity is more limited compared with other parts of the country. For instance, my own county of Prince George’s County in Maryland is majority Black, with only about one in 10 residents marking “non-Hispanic white.” Utah is about 2% Black, with only a handful of states that could be seen as “whiter” (although the Black population is growing rapidly).
And yet, diversity is more than Black versus white, and on this Chaffetz is correct. For example, Utah has a robust Hispanic population, one of the largest by percentage in the country (13th out of 50). About one in five Salt Lake and Weber county residents are Hispanic.
Additionally, Utah is an anchor of the Pacific Islander community in the lower-48 United States, with one of the highest percent of its population identifying at 1.7% (with only Nevada barely beating it out at 1.8% and Washington state following at 1.4%). The roots of Utah Pacific Islanders grow deep and long, with an established Pacific Islander community going back over 100 years to the 19th century.
Additionally, following its tradition of being a new promised land for outcasts around the world, there are a number of smaller refugee groups that have found their new homeland in the Wasatch Mountains. For example, a large contingent of Somali Bantus, a marginalized community — largely descended from East African slaves — that is culturally and ethnically distinct from the more well-known Somali community in places like Minnesota — have settled in Utah after fleeing the Somali Civil War.
Similarly, Utah has a bevy of Q’eqchi’ Mayans, or indigenous inhabitants of Guatemala, many who don’t even speak Spanish. Like elsewhere in the United States, indigenous Mayans suffer severe economic deprivation, but are finding new roots in Utah.
Utah is also a hub for Tibetans, many of whom have suffered torture and imprisonment earlier, with a large enough presence to merit a visit from the Dalai Lama.
Within the smaller Black population, there may be something to the fact that Black people in Utah are much more likely to be born outside the United States (30%) than Black people nationally (11%).
Adding this all together, the U.S. Census Bureau has put together a “Diversity Index” or a measure of the chance that “two people chosen at random will be from different race and ethnicity groups.”
On this measure, Utah scores a 41% — ranking Utah 37th out of 51 states and Washington, D.C. That is well below top-scoring states of Hawaii and California, but well above 14 other states ranging from Minnesota to Vermont, including the least-diverse Maine at 19%.
Yes, there are a lot of white non-Hispanics in Utah, but they are only 75% of the population, while Hispanics constitute 15% of the state. The next largest ethnic category in the state (4%) is a mixed category (“Two or More Races, not Hispanic or Latino”) — including, say, somebody who is half Black and half Pacific Islander (The Rock), or somebody who is half Black and half Asian (Tiger Woods).
While Utah may not be the most diverse state in the country, neither is it the least, and Utah will continue to diversify, with the Ken C. Gardner Institute at University of Utah estimating that by 2065 only 65% of Utah will be non-Hispanic white.
Even when it comes to other dimensions of diversity like religiosity, political ideology and sexual orientation, Utah isn’t quite as homogenous as some make it out to be. For instance, Utah shows political variation across geography, from red Utah county to the blue Salt Lake and Ogden counties. There’s even a slice of BYU-adjacent Provo that leans blue.
Salt Lake City also has one of the largest gay communities in the country; as a percentage there are more gay people in Salt Lake City than Los Angeles.
While yes, Utah is relatively homogenous when it comes to religion, it is not the most homogenous. Every 10 years the U.S. Religion Census releases a bevy of religious statistics, and in 2020 they placed Utah as the third least diverse state religiously, above New Hampshire and, once again, Maine. Politically, 12 states voted more Republican in the last election than Utah.
And what about inside of Utah? The most diverse county in Utah is, unsurprisingly, San Juan county near the Four Corners where about half the population is Native American (and the only Utah county where non-Hispanics are a minority), followed by Salt Lake County, where two people chosen at random have about an even chance of being from different racial/ethnic groups.
And the least diverse? On the other side of the state from San Juan in Daggett County, where 94% of the population is non-Hispanic white.
This is nothing against straight, non-Hispanic, Republican-leaning whites like myself, but we don’t have as much of a monopoly on Utah as some might think.