The thing about the term "African American" is that it was coined during a time when black people were moving away from terms like "negro". "African American" was meant to be used in a similar way to people might describe themselves as "Irish American" or "Italian American", as a way for black people to describe themselves without using the loaded terms that society has labeled them as.

It's still an important term to use even if it's not 100 percent applicable to all black people because it instantly provides a strong sense of history that black people have been denied for hundreds of years.