Over 7,000 hate crimes were reported to the FBI in 2021. Here's why that data is flawed.
USA TodayDec 23, 2022
The Facts
According to an FBI report released Monday, hate crimes in the US rose by nearly 12% in 2021 with 9,065 reported incidents, compared to 8,120 the year before.
The agency noted that approximately 12,411 individuals were reported to have been hate crime victims in 2021, with the majority believed to have been targeted due to their race or ethnicity.
The Spin
Democratic narrative
As far back as 2015, Donald Trump has been connected to documented acts of white supremacy violence and individuals even claiming he was their inspiration. While he refuses to recognize the problem, Trump has helped cultivate a tense national climate fuelled by hate. Trump's shameless exploitation of racial tensions within the US for his own political gains has inflicted true societal damage.
Republican narrative
The hysteria around the rise of white supremacy in the US is no longer reserved for those who genuinely believe in such a reality, nor only the favorite insult of left-wing politicians. The term is now applied so broadly that it has infiltrated the decision-making of the Biden administration. The woke left continues to attempt to push a narrative that does not exist, condemning the majority of the American population when in reality cases of hate crimes by white supremacists are incredibly rare.
Establishment-critical narrative
The US will only end hate attacks at home when it decides to end hate attacks internationally. The US' repeated attempts to scapegoat nations such as China are indicative of the storm of xenophobia that only continues to make Americans think such behavior is acceptable. Such rhetoric has made the lives of populations such as Asian Americans and Muslim Americans unacceptably dangerous.
