Is there something inherently wrong with a state that's almost entirely white?
It’s not just the northeast, by the way. This applies to the entire United States outside of the old South where the traditional economies are slavery which is surely racist, but it’s an exploitational form of racism. The rest of the US practiced wholesale genocide after about 1890 which forced minorities into the security of numbers in the big cities which is why you find a rural black belt in the South, but not in the rest of the US.
The majority of municipalities or counties, and towns throughout the entire USA (outside of the Old South) were made virtually all white between 1890 and 1940 deliberately through violence, and it has been maintained that way through racism including racist culture, laws, government, etc. The Civil Rights movement helped tremendously with this, but the truth of it is deliberately hidden. It’s not taught in schools.
I discovered this through James Lloewen’s book who gave a talk with Q & A about it at a DC bookstore.