FBI data shows that Anti-Asian hate crimes reported in the U.S. decreased by 33 percent in 2022, after there was a rise in previous years.
Many American cities, such as New York City, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, saw an increase in offenses targeting Asian people following the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Data released as part of the FBI’s annual hate crime statistics report earlier this month shows that there were 499 reported incidents that involved anti-Asian bias in 2022 versus the 746 in 2021.
FBI Hate Crime Statistics
According to FBI data, hate crimes reported in the U.S. have been increasing steadily for years and law enforcement agencies even reported the highest number of hate crime incidents in 2022 since 1991, when the FBI began tracking them.
More than 13,000 people were reportedly victims of hate crimes last year, the FBI stated. The most common were attacks that singled out people based on their race, ethnicity, or ancestry, which was followed by crimes based on religion and sexual orientation. Incidents involving bias against Black people comprise 52 percent of crimes that are motivated by race or ethnicity.
Although the FBI’s annual report is currently the most comprehensive look at hate crimes across the country, the data it collects only represents a fraction of the actual number of incidents that occur. This is not only due to lack of reporting, but also gaps in government level data collecting, according to CNN.
In addition, the FBI does not require law enforcement agencies to submit its own data to the FBI and the amount of agencies that voluntarily submit it each year varies. According to the FBI’s National Crime Victimization Survey, although local jurisdictions do report data, they are very likely undercount, as less than half of hate crime victims report their incidents to the police.
The agency did note that law enforcement participation in the FBI’s report increased in 2022 compared to previous years.
