The FBI recently updated its 2021 hate crime statistics and reported that supplemental data found that antisemitic hate crimes jumped from 324 incidents to 814, according to the report.
The FBI came under heavy scrutiny from Jewish groups when it originally published its 2021 hate crime report in December 2022 after it was discovered that several major cities with large Jewish populations did not report their numbers. In its updated Monday report, the FBI’s national data showed that antisemitic hate crimes more than doubled from 324 to 814 in 2021. (RELATED: Light Sentences For Antisemitic Attacks Set A Dangerous Precedent, Experts Warn)
The number of victims also increased by 38 from 2020 to 2021.
Antisemitic assaults increased by 16% from 2020, with 109 incidents reported. Hate crimes, in general, rose to 10,840 incidents, the highest on record in over two decades, as opposed to the initially reported 7,262, according to the Anti-Defamation League.
LONDON, ENGLAND – MARCH 26: Protesters hold placards as they demonstrate in Parliament Square against anti-Semitism on March 26, 2018, in London, England. (Photo by Jack Taylor/Getty Images)
The FBI reiterated its previous reasoning for the initial lack of data, arguing that the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) that was first introduced in 2015 made it harder for police departments in certain cities to report data, in a statement given with the report.
“The transition from the retired SRS to the more-detailed NIBRS led to considerably lower agency participation in the UCR Program, including the hate crime data collection,” the FBI said. “This resulted in an inadequate representation of bias-motivated criminal incidents in the nation. Consequently, the UCR Program opted to temporarily reinstate the acceptance of SRS data to augment hate crime statistics for 2021 to present a more detailed accounting of hate crime incidents reported to law enforcement.”
The argument did not go over well when the original report was released after Jewish communities pointed out that major cities with large Jewish populations had been notably absent from the original report, including New York City, Miami and Los Angeles. The lack of data from these departments sparked concern that antisemitic hate crimes were being dramatically underreported.
Kenneth Marcus, founder and chairman of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Law, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the new report proves hate crimes have “surged under this administration.”
“I’m glad to see that the Biden administration is finally providing more accurate data, which they should have done in the first place,” Marcus said, “It is unfortunate that they didn’t take this action before they were publicly taken to task for the extraordinary incompetence revealed in their prior report. When the private citizens provide false information to the FBI, they get indicted, [but] when the FBI provides false information to the public, they want to do a do-over.”
Holly Morris, FBI spokesperson, told the DCNF that the agency had planned to “retroactively accept data” due to the large gaps created by new system.
“[T]here was a decrease in data because many agencies were unable to complete the transition of their collection method to NIBRS,” Morris explained. “The impact of this decrease in hate crime data – a collection where estimations are not used – was considerable when providing a national picture. Therefore, the UCR Program opted to retroactively accept data from law enforcement agencies that still collected it under SRS in 2021 to provide a more accurate picture of reported hate crime incidents in the United States.”
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