Hate crimes surged during Trump’s first year, a record high since 9/11

"Shouldn’t this urgent crisis be subject of first post-recess Senate Judiciary Committee hearing today, instead of ramming through more Trump judges? Our lives are at stake."

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DeAndre Harris brutally attacked at "Unite The Right" rally in Charlottesville. (Image: Zach D. Roberts / NationofChange)

A new report by the FBI shows that hate crimes across the country increased by 17 percent in 2017, during Trump’s first year as President of the United States.

Shockingly this statistic does not take into account several key events of hate-driven violence. Other federal surveys suggest that due to the “glaring omissions” of the report, it may undercount the number of hate crimes by the hundreds of thousands.

According to the new FBI data, 2017 saw a spike in hate crimes that hasn’t been seen since 2001. Experts have attributed the spike to the surge in race and religious-based attacks, such as violent demonstrations, and the emergence of new hate groups.

Specific spikes include anti-Jewish crimes, which rose by more than 37 percent, anti-Hispanic and Latino crimes, which rose by more than 24 percent, and anti-American Indian or Alaska Native crimes, which rose by nearly 63 percent. Anti-Muslim crimes decreased by about 10 percent, but only after the sharp increases in recent years.

Nearly 58 percent of incidents were motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry. 22 percent were motivated by religion and almost 16 percent were motivated by sexual orientation. The remainder were motivated by disability, gender, gender identity, and multiple kinds of bias. There were a total of 7,175 hate crimes reported in 2017. 2,013 were against black Americans, 938 against Jews, and 237 against Muslims. 1,130 were against people for their sexual orientation.

As the report covers the first year of Trump’s time in the White House and Trump is well known for spewing and stoking racist sentiment these new statistics aren’t completely out of the blue. However, as the NAACP says they require “Congress’s full attention…Our lives are at stake.”

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