Hate crimes against Asian Americans in California spiked by 107% in 2020, new data shows
Reports of hate crimes across California — particularly involving the Asian American and Pacific Islander community — rose exponentially from 2019 to 2020, according to the state attorney general’s office.
Attorney General Rob Bonda described the year as an “epidemic of hate” against the AAPI community as reports of hate crimes targeting Asian Americans increased 107%.
The wave peaked in March and April, at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a report from his office.
Overall hate crimes increased 31% from 2019 to 2020, with a total of 1,330 hate crimes reported in the past year. Officers referred 430 of those cases to prosecution.
Bonta said the tally his office created likely under-counts the number of hate crimes in the state last year because many incidents go unreported or are not investigated by police.
“There are very notable and significant spikes in anti-AAPI hate crimes, but also very underreported. While it’s critical to have this latest data, it’s really another piece of the puzzle to help fill in the potential gaps,” said Bonta, who is California’s first Filipino American attorney general.
Anti-Black hate crimes remain the most prevalent in the state, with 456 crimes reported in 2020, an 87% increase from the previous year.
The number of hate crimes reported against Asian Americans rose from 43 in 2019 to 89 in 2020.
Alongside the annual hate crimes report, the Attorney General’s office released a special report on anti-Asian hate crimes during the pandemic. The report directly ties this surge to anti-Asian rhetoric during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Attorney General’s office also released a law enforcement bulletin and guidance for prosecutors on how to address hate crimes at the local level. These tools are meant to ensure that all district attorneys and local law enforcement are following the same set of standards when it comes to identifying what is and isn’t a hate crime.
Language is a barrier that has kept many victims from getting help, said Carl Chan, the Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce president, who was the victim of a hate crime in April. Brochures educating hate crime victims are now available in 25 languages so that more people are aware of the options available to them after an attack.
Reporting hate crimes can help connect victims to further resources, and help the state get a better grip on how many hate crimes occur each year, Oakland City Councilwoman Sheng Thao said during the press conference.
An independent organization called Stop AAPI Hate made its own tally of hate crimes last year, counting 1,116 incidents of anti-Asian discrimination in California from March to July of 2020.
“Here in Chinatown we have seen a decline [in business] not just because of the pandemic, but because people are fearful of walking the streets to go do basic things,” Thao said. It doesn’t matter if you’re in the AAPI community or the Black community or the Hispanic community, we must stand in support of each other and say that we are not okay with any sort of hate crime and we must report it.”
This story was originally published June 30, 2021 at 3:01 PM with the headline "Hate crimes against Asian Americans in California spiked by 107% in 2020, new data shows."