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After three years of rising hate crime statistics, the FBI's annual report shows a leveling off of those crimes. That's the good news. The bad news is that the attacks of hate have grown more violent and deadly.
The data gathered from 2018 shows that the year was the deadliest and most violent year for hate since 2001. There were 24 hate crime related deaths and 3,099 violent crime offenses in 2018.
“We’re seeing a leaner and meaner type of hate crime going on,”Brian Levin, co-author of the FBI report and director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University San Bernardino, told NPR. ”Homicides were up and crimes against persons were up and that’s an important thing to look at.”
For additional information about the hate crimes statistics released today, visit the DOJ Hate Crimes Facts and Statistics page.
The majority of the reported hate crimes were motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry bias (59.6 percent). Additional biases included religion (18.7C), sexual orientation (16.7%), gender identity (2.2%), disability (2.1%t), and gender (0.7%).
“We’re seeing a shift from the more casual offender with more shallow prejudices to a bit more of an older assailant who acts alone,” Levin says in an independent analysis of the report. “There’s a diversifying base of groups that are being targeted. We’re getting back to more violence.”
In plain language, that means acts of vandalism, such as spraypainting a racist message on a house of worship, has gone down, but physical attacks such as shootings or beatings against individuals have risen.
In 2018, law enforcement agencies reported that 4,954 single-bias hate crime offenses were motivated by race/ethnicity/ancestry. Of these offenses:
In plain language, that means acts of vandalism, such as spraypainting a racist message on a house of worship, has gone down, but physical attacks such as shootings or beatings against individuals have risen.
In 2018, law enforcement agencies reported that 4,954 single-bias hate crime offenses were motivated by race/ethnicity/ancestry. Of these offenses:
- 46.9 percent were motivated by anti-Black or African American bias.
- 20.2 percent stemmed from anti-White bias.
- 13.0 percent were classified as anti-Hispanic or Latino bias.
- 4.1 percent were motivated by anti-American Indian or Alaska Native bias.
- 3.5 percent resulted from anti-Asian bias.
- 3.4 percent were a result of bias against groups of individuals consisting of more than one race (anti-multiple races, group).
- 2.0 percent were classified as anti-Arab bias.
- 0.5 percent (26 offenses) were motivated by bias of anti-Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander.
- 6.4 percent were the result of an anti-Other Race/Ethnicity/Ancestry bias.
Other highlights of the report:
Also, the definition of what constitutes a hate crime varies from agency to agency. However, the report does provide a barometer of the state of race relations year-to-year and whether race relations is getting better or worse.
“At the end of the day, this data simply isn’t giving us the accurate information we need to effectively counteract hate against targeted communities,” said Sim Singh, Sikh Coalition senior manager of Policy and Advocacy. “It’s past time for action. Congress must pass the next generation of common-sense legislation that equips law enforcement to better identify and track hate incidents.
Donald Trump's hateful rhetoric and policies is being blamed for the rise in hate crimes since he began campaigning. "White supremacist violence, fanned by the flames of racist rhetoric and policies at the federal level like the Muslim Ban and family separation, continues to devastate Black and brown communities," said South Asian Americans Together Leading Together in a prepared statement.
"The current Administration continues to promote rather than address the root causes of this violence. Comprehensive data collection is a critical component of documenting the problem, but acknowledging and actively combating white supremacy is the most important step to ensuring this violence doesn’t continue to wreak havoc on people’s lives," the statement concluded.
- In hate crimes fueled by racism, African Americans continue to be the most frequently targeted, though anti-Black incidents overall fell to a record low share of all hate crime in 2018.
- Latinos continued to experience an increase in racially motivated incidents. Levin, the researcher, said such incidents rose 13 percent over one year and 48 percent over five years.
- The LGBTQ community also faced bias-motivated attacks in 2018. Incidents targeting gay males increased by nearly 7 perfect, and anti-transgender hate crimes rose nearly 34 percent.
- Anti-Latino, anti-gay, anti-Asian, anti-disability, anti-transgender, anti-Sikh and anti-White hate crimes increased in 2018.
- Hate crimes towards Sikhs in the U.S. TRIPLED from 20 incidents in 2017 to 60 incidents in 2018.
- There were 82 Anti-Arab hate crimes recorded in 2018 – the second-highest total since the FBI added an anti-Arab category in 2015.
- There were 188 anti-Muslim hate crimes recorded, down slightly from last year but the fifth-highest total on record.
- There were 14 anti-Hindu hate crimes recorded in 2018 – down from 15 in 2017.
- Of the known offenders, 53% were identified as white
Also, the definition of what constitutes a hate crime varies from agency to agency. However, the report does provide a barometer of the state of race relations year-to-year and whether race relations is getting better or worse.
“At the end of the day, this data simply isn’t giving us the accurate information we need to effectively counteract hate against targeted communities,” said Sim Singh, Sikh Coalition senior manager of Policy and Advocacy. “It’s past time for action. Congress must pass the next generation of common-sense legislation that equips law enforcement to better identify and track hate incidents.
Donald Trump's hateful rhetoric and policies is being blamed for the rise in hate crimes since he began campaigning. "White supremacist violence, fanned by the flames of racist rhetoric and policies at the federal level like the Muslim Ban and family separation, continues to devastate Black and brown communities," said South Asian Americans Together Leading Together in a prepared statement.
"The current Administration continues to promote rather than address the root causes of this violence. Comprehensive data collection is a critical component of documenting the problem, but acknowledging and actively combating white supremacy is the most important step to ensuring this violence doesn’t continue to wreak havoc on people’s lives," the statement concluded.
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Major findings of the report:
- 2018 was the deadliest and most violent year for hate since 2001. There were 24 hate crime related deaths and 3,099 violent crime offenses in 2018.
- Hate crimes towards Sikhs in the U.S. TRIPLED from 20 incidents in 2017 to 60 incidents in 2018.
- There were 82 Anti-Arab hate crimes recorded in 2018 – the second-highest total since the FBI added an anti-Arab category in 2015.
- There were 188 anti-Muslim hate crimes recorded, down slightly from last year but the fifth-highest total on record.
- There were 14 anti-Hindu hate crimes recorded in 2018 – down from 15 in 2017.
- Of the known offenders, over 50% identified as white
Data collection and underreporting of hate violence remains a significant problem. The Federal Bureau of Justice Statistics reports an average of 250,000 hate crimes every year in the U.S. That’s 35 times more than what the FBI documented in 2018. Only 13% of the over 16,000 participating law enforcement agencies reported any hate crimes in their jurisdictions. Disturbingly, the murders of Khalid Jabara, Srinivas Kuchibhotla, and Heather Heyer in 2016 and 2017, like so many other hate crimes, have not been included in official FBI statistics. The vast majority of crimes are going unreported.
And as we saw in 2017, white supremacy continues to be a primary motivation behind hate violence in the US. In both 2017 and 2018, over 50% of known offenders of reported hate crimes identified as white.
Of the over 500 incidents of hate violence targeting South Asians, Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, Middle Eastern, and Arab Americans thatSAALT has documented since November 2016, at least 80% have been motivated by anti-Muslim sentiment. In SAALT’s 2018 report “Communities on Fire,” one in every five perpetrators of hate violence referenced President Trump, a Trump administration policy, or Trump campaign slogan.
White supremacist violence, fanned by the flames of racist rhetoric and policies at the federal level like the Muslim Ban and family separation, continues to devastate Black and brown communities. Anti-Black hate crimes accounted for more than 25% of violent hate crimes reported in 2018 and the majority of incidents motivated by race.
The current Administration continues to promote rather than address the root causes of this violence. Comprehensive data collection is a critical component of documenting the problem, but acknowledging and actively combating white supremacy is the most important step to ensuring this violence doesn’t continue to wreak havoc on people’s lives.
The report indicated an increase in “crimes against persons,” according to NPR. Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University San Bernardino, spoke to the news outlet about the conclusions that can be made from the data. “We’re seeing a leaner and meaner type of hate crime going on,” he said. ”Homicides were up and crimes against persons were up and that’s an important thing to look at.”
Levin, who also co-authored a law enforcement data report that was released on Tuesday, told NPR that hate crimes in 2018 maintained a typical pattern:
On Nov. 12 The FBI released Hate Crime Statistics, 2018, the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program’s latest compilation about bias-motivated incidents throughout the nation. The 2018 data, submitted by 16,039 law enforcement agencies, provide information about the offenses, victims, offenders, and locations of hate crimes.Levin said the increase in assaults was almost evenly distributed across demographic groups, with African-Americans, Jews, Whites, gays and Latinos targeted the most. As in previous years, the majority of hate crimes reported in 2018 were motivated by bias against race and ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation.
Law enforcement agencies submitted incident reports involving 7,120 criminal incidents and 8,496 related offenses as being motivated by bias toward race, ethnicity, ancestry, religion, sexual orientation, disability, gender, and gender identity. Please note the UCR Program does not estimate offenses for the jurisdictions of agencies that do not submit reports. Highlights of Hate Crime Statistics, 2018 follow. (Due to rounding, percentage breakdowns may not add to 100.0 percent.)
Victims of Hate Crime Incidents
There were 7,036 single-bias incidents involving 8,646 victims. A percent distribution of victims by bias type shows that 59.6 percent of victims were targeted because of the offenders’ race/ethnicity/ancestry bias; 18.7 percent were targeted because of the offenders’ religious bias; 16.7 percent were victimized because of the offenders’ sexual-orientation bias; 2.2 percent were targeted because of the offenders’ gender identity bias; 2.1 percent were victimized because of the offenders’ disability bias; and 0.7 percent were victimized because of the offenders’ gender bias.
There were 84 multiple-bias hate crime incidents, which involved 173 victims.
Offenses by Crime Category
Of the 5,566 hate crime offenses classified as crimes against persons in 2018, 46.0 percent were for intimidation, 34.0 percent were for simple assault, and 18.4 percent were for aggravated assault. Twenty-four (24) murders and 22 rapes were reported as hate crimes. The remaining 39 hate crime offenses were reported in the category of other.
There were 2,641 hate crime offenses classified as crimes against property. The majority of these (71.0 percent) were acts of destruction/damage/vandalism. Robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, arson, and other offenses accounted for the remaining 29.0 percent of crimes against property.
Two hundred eighty-nine (289) additional offenses were classified as crimes against society. This crime category represents society’s prohibition against engaging in certain types of activity such as gambling, prostitution, and drug violations. These are typically victimless crimes in which property is not the object.
Known Offenders
In the UCR Program, the term known offender does not imply that the suspect’s identity is known; rather, the term indicates that some aspect of the suspect was identified, thus distinguishing the suspect from an unknown offender. Law enforcement agencies specify the number of offenders and, when possible, the race of the offender or offenders as a group. Beginning in 2013, law enforcement began reporting whether suspects were juveniles or adults, as well as the suspect’s ethnicity when possible.
Of the 6,266 known offenders, 53.6 percent were white, and 24.0 percent were black or African American. Other races accounted for the remaining known offenders: 1.3 percent were Asian; 1.0 percent were American Indian or Alaska Native; 0.3 percent were Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander; and 6.9 percent were of a group of multiple races. The race was unknown for 12.9 percent.
Of the 5,349 known offenders for whom ethnicity was reported, 29.9 percent were not Hispanic or Latino, 8.9 percent were Hispanic or Latino, and 1.6 percent were in a group of multiple ethnicities. Ethnicity was unknown for 59.5 percent of these offenders.
Of the 5,589 known offenders for whom ages were known, 84.7 percent were 18 years of age or older.
Locations of Hate Crimes
Law enforcement agencies may specify the location of an offense within a hate crime incident as 1 of 46 location designations. In 2018, most hate crime incidents (25.7 percent) occurred in or near residences/homes. More than 18 percent (18.7) occurred on highways/roads/alleys/streets/sidewalks; 9.2 percent occurred at schools/colleges; 5.3 percent happened at parking/drop lots/garages; and 3.7 percent took place in churches/synagogues/temples/mosques. The location was reported as other/unknown for 11.2 percent of hate crime incidents. The remaining 26.1 percent of hate crime incidents took place at other or multiple locations.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) is dedicated to preventing and combating hate crimes. To learn more about this work and to find events, news, and resources related to hate crimes, please visit the DOJ Hate Crimes website. For additional information about the hate crimes statistics released today, visit the DOJ Hate Crimes Facts and Statistics page.
The number of hate crime incidents reported to the FBI decreased slightly from 2017 to 2018, according to the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program’s annual Hate Crime Statistics report, released today.
Law enforcement reported 7,120 hate crimes to the FBI’s UCR Program last year, down slightly from the 7,175 incidents reported the previous year.
There were 7,036 single-bias hate crimes reported to UCR in 2018. From those incidents, there were 8,646 victims.
The majority of the reported hate crimes were motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry bias (59.6 percent). Additional biases included religion (18.7 percent), sexual orientation (16.7 percent), gender identity (2.2 percent), disability (2.1 percent), and gender (0.7 percent).
The report, Hate Crime Statistics, 2018, includes hate crime information for last year. The data is broken down by location, offenders, bias types, and victims.
More than 16,000 law enforcement agencies reported their hate crime statistics to the FBI last year. The FBI has been working with law enforcement across the country to encourage reporting of hate crime statistics. Reporting hate crime data to the UCR Program helps the public and researchers gain a more accurate picture of hate crimes. It also allows law enforcement to develop data-focused approaches to combating hate crimes.
Hate crimes are the highest investigative priority of the FBI’s civil rights program.
Full report: Hate Crime Statistics, 2018
Resources
FBI Releases 2018 Hate Crime Statistics
Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program
Hate Crime
Civil Rights
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