<p>There are US federal governmental institutions that explicitly include people of Portuguese cultures as “Hispanic”, such as the US Dept of Transportation and the US Dept of Small Business Administration. The US Census lets people from Brazil or Portugal self-identify as Hispanic if they wish. As far as schools, there are some that clearly identify students or applicants of Portuguese-speaking descent, particularly Brazilians, as Latinos, and others that explicitly designate and consider people of any Portuguese-descent as “minority” candidates, such as Brown University. In practice, most schools see enough cultural affinities between the Spanish and the Portuguese-speakers to accept the latter as “Hispanic” or “Latinos”. Perhaps that’s why there has long been a precedent in the country’s universities to combine the departments of Spanish and Portuguese Studies.</p>