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Mexicans are the largest Hispanic group in the US, so that's what people think of when they think of Spanish speaker.
And good grief, Latin Americans stereotype too. I'm Black. Depending on where I go in Latin America, the assumption is that Americans are white and people are more prone to think I'm from say Brazil, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Mexico (yes there are Black Mexicans and I've been asked this).
You're being hyper defensive because many Americans know little about Latinos, which is ultimately just silly.
In some countries people are not well educated and a lot of people has a second grade or third grade education and that why you meet people who doesn't know anything about America. What you might find is very badly educated people who cannot even pinpoint their country in a map, that why you get asked such questions. But I can assure those countries does recognize African heritage in the United States and their books show it that way and any educated person in Latin America who has gone to school knows very well about African-american history. I was even taught about Martin Luther King and Malcolm X in my country in history classes and how Abraham Lincoln gave freedom to slaves in the south.
But the Hispanic race concept in America is not a silly mistake nor a stereotype mistake. No my friend, even schools in America are teaching Hispanic as a race and this is not some stereotype mistake. No educational entity in any country happens to be that stupid and ignorant about other people unless the government is the one behind it.
Latin Americans all come from different countries and will call each other by the country they're from, like el venezolano, la colombiana, el argentino, etc. All Latin American countries have distinct cultures so if you mess two countries up people will get upset. Chile in particular has feuds with all of its neighbors so people will get upset if you confuse them with chileans lol. The word "latino" does unite latin-americans, but not as much as their regional identity. And in several countries the regional identity goes even deeper than just nationality. In Colombia you have tons of regional identities, paisa, rolo, costeno, caleno, etc. In Peru you have limeno, cusqueno, selvatico, etc. All these regional identities, they trump being latino. In the US hardship and discrimination would force the latin american people to bunch together
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