Despite the NAACP’s recent travel advisory to Florida, Black Americans have been flourishing in the booming Sunshine State for more than four decades.
In 1980, when my New York City parents bought a retirement condo in Fort Lauderdale, Florida’s population was 9,747,000, of whom 1,352,000, or 13.9%, were Black.
In 2022, the Sunshine State’s population had soared to 22,245,000, a spectacular 128% increase. Even more stupendously, Black Floridians had skyrocketed by 180%, to 3,782,000, or 17% of the total population.
Only Texas, with 3,964,000 Black residents exceeded Florida’s total. Georgia ranked third last year with 3,601,000.
Secondly, Black students in Florida’s K-12 public schools now account for 603,000 of the state’s 2,833,000 students, or 21.3%.
Only Texas with 695,000 Black students, and Georgia with 634,000, surpass Florida’s fantastic enrollment.
The three mega-populated, Republican-trifecta states account for 1,932,000 of America’s 7,410,000 Black students, or a very robust 26.5%,
By contrast, four super-states with a Democratic trifecta have an anemic — and declining — 1,280,000, or 17.3% of the nation’s total. New York has 413,000 Black public-school students; Illinois, 308,000; California, 300,000; and Michigan, 259,000.
Third, on the 2022 “Nation’s Report Card,” the combined 934 points for Black Floridian 4th and 8th graders, in math and reading, is significantly higher than the totals of their counterparts in the four dystopian Democratic ones.
Black students in New York and Illinois scored 903 points each; California, 902; and Michigan, 876. With 12 points equaling one grade level, Florida’s 934 points is between 31 and 58 points higher, or a hefty advantage between 2.6 and 4.8 years.
The national average for Black students is 913, a catastrophic 19-point decline, or 1.6 years, since the pre-COVID “Nation’s Report Card” in 2019.
Inexcusably, not a single NAACP press statement, since October 2022 when the latest results were released, acknowledges this historic educational regression, or presents an urgent remedial plan to overcome these grievous losses.
The fourth impressive accomplishment of Black Floridians in 2023 is a 10th ranking among the 50 states for entrepreneurship, as compared to 26th place in 2022. The Merchant Maverick Data Report commends the Sunshine State for having the 5th highest Black-owned businesses per capita, the 4th lowest unemployment rate at 2.5%; and no income tax.
Texas and Georgia have also made this prestigious Top 10 list. But New York, under Democratic Gov, Kathy Hochul, ranks a dismal 23rd overall for Black entrepreneurship; 43rd in unemployment at 4.3%; and 47th with a 10.9% income tax.
California, rapidly disintegrating under Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, ranks even worse: 26th overall in Black entrepreneurship; 38th in unemployment at 4.1%; and 49th with an income tax of 13.3%.
Fifth, during the COVID pandemic, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis did a much better job of protecting Black residents, than his counterparts in several mega-states with Democratic governors, according to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.
Black Floridians have suffered 12,889 COVID deaths, or 341 per 100,000.
Black New Yorkers have suffered 14,690 deaths, or 424 per 100,000.
Black residents of New Jersey have suffered 5,724 COVID deaths, or 404 per 100,000.
In America as a whole, Blacks have suffered 155,807 deaths, or 344 per 100,000. There were 45,327,000 Black Americans in 2022.
Therefore, New York’s death rate is 24%, and New Jersey’s 18%, higher than Florida’s for this cohort.
In addition to vigorous population growth, excellent public-schools, a booming economy and first-rate public health, Florida cities have low crime rates. PopulationU website lists the 75 American cities with the highest violent crime per capita in 2022, and none is in Florida.
But Texas has 11 of these highest-crime cities; Colorado and California, 6 each; Ohio, 5; and North Carolina and Tennessee, 4 each.
Ironically, one day after the NAACP’s tendentious travel warning was announced, Florida’s tourist department reported that during the first quarter of 2023, a record 37.9 million travelers visited the Sunshine State.
During the last 35 years, including this past winter, I have spent a lot of time in the state and witnessed the amazing growth and development. In 2022, Florida’s Gross Domestic Product was $1.39 trillion, which ranks behind California’s $3.6 trillion, Texas’ $2.36 trillion, and New York’s $2.05 trillion.
DP last year was $25.46 trillion.
Finally, NAACP’s leaders, Democratic party bosses, and the totally-partisan Liberal Media are freaked-out by the humongous, ongoing population growth in Southern states over the last four decades.
They are also panicked by the rise of prominent Southern Black Republicans, who include U.S. Sen, Tim Scott of South Carolina;Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears; Florida Congressman Byron Donalds; North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson; and Daniel Cameron, the attorney general of Kentucky and the party’s candidate for governor in 2023.
Democrats are further traumatized, as Deroy Murdock points out in a recent Newsmax opinion article, by the collapse of President Joe Biden’s approval rating among Black voters, from 82% in January 2021 to 52% in May 2023.
Mark Schulte is a retired New York City schoolteacher and mathematician who has written extensively about science and the history of science. Read Mark Schulte's Reports — More Here.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.