Trump’s Legacy: Hate Crimes Surged To A 12 Year High In 2020

One of the many bad legacies of the Donald Trump presidency was hate crimes reaching a 12 year high during his final year in office.

CNN reported:

The report, released on Monday, found more than 7,700 criminal hate crime incidents were reported to the FBI in 2020, an increase of about 450 incidents over 2019. The increase comes even as fewer agencies reported hate crime incidents in their jurisdictions to the FBI than in previous years.

Last year had the highest tally of reported hate crime incidents since 2008, when 7,783 incidents were reported to the FBI.

The data released on Monday showed that bias against African Americans overwhelmingly comprised the largest category of reported hate crime offenses pertaining to race, with a total of 56% of those crimes motivated by anti-Black or African American bias. Asians have been targeted during the Covid-19 pandemic amid online and political rhetoric stigmatizing them, though this category of hate crime is often underreported.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association