Image: screenshot of ABC New YouTube Channel, February 6, 2026
The term "Foundatioal Black Americans" has now been used, possibly for the first time, by a mainstream US News outlet. Also called FBA, Foundational Black Americans describes the Black US population who has roots in North American from even before the founding of the United States in 1776. FBA lineages include at least 45 million people, and does not include immigrants, unless they also have one parent who has a long family history in the United States.
FBA is a rejection of the term "African American," which FBA advocates say removes the distinctiveness of the centuries-long Black American struggle by lumping it together with that of recent immigrants, even illegal migrants. FBA lineages may include Africans transported here centuries ago, along with those descended from Indigenous people already living in the Americas prior to 1492.
