Do US documents do that? In my recollection, you're usually asked to specify a race, and then "Latino" is included in a separate ethnicity question.

You're correct. US documents generally have race and ethnicity separate, with Hispanic/Latino origin being an ethnicity.

You are correct. Most people who identify as Latino/Hispanic in the US consider that to be their race though, not ethnicity. So Census data has a lot of people who identify as Race: Other Ethnicity: Hispanic/Latino.

Race is distinct from Nationality. "Latino" is not a synonym for citizens of Latin American countries, but the name of a racial group which originated from that region of the world.

It gets confusing with countries like China, Japan, and India, which are more racially homogeneous, and where the country name is the same as the (common) name of the predominate racial groups.

The parent is talking about ethnicity (culture), not nationality. "Latino" isn't a race, it's an ethnicity. In particular, there are many "races" of people who are Latino (white Cubans, indigenous Mexicans, black Brazilians, etc can all be "Latino" despite different races and nationalities). Indeed the "latin" in "Latin America" and "Latino" was originally a language category--these peoples all spoke romance languages (Spanish, French, Portuguese, etc).

> “Latino" is not a synonym for citizens of Latin American countries, but the name of a racial group which originated from that region of the world.

It really isn’t. Where are you getting this idea from?