El Paso. El Paso is a city in and the county seat of El Paso County, Texas, United States. The 2020 population of the city from the U.S. Census Bureau was 678,815, making it the 22nd-most populous city in the U.S., the most populous city in West Texas, and the sixth-most populous city in Texas. The city has the largest Hispanic population share of main cities in the U.S. at 81%.Its metropolitan statistical area covers all of El Paso and Hudspeth counties in Texas, and had a population of 868,859 in 2020. El Paso stands on the Rio Grande across the Mexico-United States border from Ciudad Juárez, the most populous city in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. The Las Cruces area, in the neighboring U.S. state of New Mexico, has a population of 219,561. On the U.S. side, the El Paso metropolitan area forms part of the larger El Paso-Las Cruces combined statistical area, which has a population of 1,092,742. These three cities form a combined international metropolitan area sometimes referred to as the Paso del Norte or the Borderplex. The region of 2.7 million people constitutes the largest bilingual and binational workforce in the Western Hemisphere. The city is home to three publicly traded companies, and former Western Refining, now Marathon Petroleum, as well as home to the Medical Center of the Americas, the only medical research and care provider complex in West Texas and Southern New Mexico, and the University of Texas at El Paso, the city's primary university. The city hosts the annual Sun Bowl college football postseason game, the second-oldest bowl game in the country. El Paso has a strong federal and military presence. William Beaumont Army Medical Center, Biggs Army Airfield, and Fort Bliss are located in the area. Also headquartered in El Paso is the Drug Enforcement Administration domestic field division 7, El Paso Intelligence Center, Joint Task Force North, United States Border Patrol El Paso Sector, and U.S. Border Patrol Special Operations Group. El Paso is a five-time All-America City Award winner, winning in 1969, 2010, 2018, 2020, and 2021, and Congressional Quarterly ranked it in the top-three safest large cities in the United States between 1997 and 2014, including holding the title of the safest city between 2011 and 2014. El Paso is also the largest majority-Hispanic city in the United States, with 83% of its population being Hispanic. The El Paso region has had human settlement for thousands of years, as evidenced by Folsom points from hunter-gatherers found at Hueco Tanks. This suggests 10,000 to 12,000 years of human habitation. The earliest known cultures in the region were maize farmers. When the Spanish arrived, the Manso, Suma, and Jumano tribes populated the area. These were subsequently incorporated into the mestizo culture, along with immigrants from central Mexico, captives from Comanchería, and genízaros of various ethnic groups. The Mescalero Apache were also present. The Chamuscado and Rodríguez Expedition trekked through present-day El Paso and forded the Rio Grande where they visited the land that is present-day New Mexico in 1581-1582. The expedition was led by Francisco Sánchez, called El Chamuscado, and Fray Agustín Rodríguez, the first Spaniards known to have walked along the Rio Grande and visited the Pueblo Indians since Francisco Vásquez de Coronado 40 years earlier. Spanish explorer Don Juan de Oñate was born in 1550 in Zacatecas, Zacatecas, Mexico, and was the first New Spain explorer known to have rested and stayed 10 days by the Rio Grande near El Paso, in 1598, celebrating a Thanksgiving Mass there on April 30, 1598. Four survivors of the Narváez expedition, Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, Alonso del Castillo Maldonado, Andrés Dorantes de Carranza, and a Moor that was enslaved Estevanico, are thought to have crossed the Rio Grande into present-day Mexico about 75 miles south of El Paso in 1535. El Paso del Norte was founded on the south bank of the Río Bravo del Norte, in 1659 by Fray Garcia de San Francisco. In 1680, the small village of El Paso became the temporary base for Spanish governance of the territory of New Mexico as a result of the Pueblo Revolt, until 1692, when Santa Fe was reconquered and once again became the capital. The Texas Revolution was generally not felt in the region, as the American population was small, not more than 10% of the population.