More than 8,000 people were victims of bias-motivated incidents in 2021, according to the FBI.

The crimes varied from intimidation and assault to rape and murder.

The FBI says 64.8% of the victims were targeted because of their race or ethnicity and 15.6% were targeted because of sexual orientation. Biases toward religions, gender identity and disability were also contributing factors in smaller percentages, the FBI said.

Most of the incidents, 32%, happened at or near a person's home. Nearly 17% occurred on highways, roads, alleys, streets and sidewalks,

The FBI says most of the suspects, 56.1%, are white. Black or African Americans accounted for 21.3% of the suspects. American Indians or Alaska Natives followed with 1% each.

The FBI's data, however, appears incomplete. For 2021, the data came from 11,834 participating law enforcement agencies. In 2020, the FBI received information from more than 15,000 agencies.

The FBI blames a shift in how data is collected. It says some law enforcement agencies, some large, didn't transition to a new data collection system in time to be represented in the report.

"As more agencies transition to the NIBRS data collection with continued support from the Justice Department, hate crime statistics in coming years will provide a richer and more complete picture of hate crimes nationwide," the FBI stated.

WASHINGTON — From a possible TikTok ban being proposed in Congress to an increase in the United States military presence in the Pacific, it's no secret that relations between the United States and China are relatively tense right now.

In fact, the relationship with China is shaping policy around the world.

Just this week a new submarine agreement with the United Kingdom and Australia was announced, in part, to compete with China.

However, many Chinese Americans fear the tense relationship could result in an increase in hate crimes or discrimination.

CHINESE AMERICAN HISTORY

Because of all the recent stories — and tension with Beijing — it is worth a visit to the Chinese American museum in Washington, D.C., to speak with David Uy, the executive director.

"People often ask, what does a Chinese-American look like — I am one of them — I am half Chinese, and I am half Italian," Uy said.

What's important during this time is that all Americans know that just because politics with Beijing is tense, it doesn't give anyone an excuse to be rude — or hateful — to their neighbors, he urged.

"You may have issues with a country but those people in the U.S. are as American as you," Uy said.

"We don't want spy balloons drifting over the country," Uy added.

Unfortunately hate crimes against Asian Americans are on the rise.

Newly updated data from the FBI shows that in 2021 there were over 700 anti-Asian incidents nationwide. Uy's museum has felt it first-hand.

"We've had a rock thrown threw our window, and we have had hate speech left at one of our exhibits," he said.

Part of Uy's goal is to educate Americans more on Chinese-American history in the U.S.

For instance, the transcontinental railroad was largely built by Chinese laborers.

"Ten miles of rail track was laid in a single day," Uy said. One fear he has, is a return to the past.

From the 1880s to the 1960s, the United States Congress significantly restricted — and for many years, banned — Chinese citizens from migrating to the United States.

The Chinese Exclusion Act remains one of the most restrictive immigration laws ever passed by Congress.

"They were not always the most welcomed of immigrants," Uy said.

All of this is worth keeping in mind as the political rivalry between the United States and China intensifies.

Any political expert will tell you, it's a rivalry that won't be going away soon.

BRUNSWICK, Ga. —

The man convicted of murder for shooting Ahmaud Arbery withdrew his guilty plea on a federal hate crime charge Friday, electing to stand trial for a second time in the 2020 killing of a Black man that became part of a larger national reckoning over racial injustice.

Travis McMichael reversed his plan to plead guilty in the federal case days after a U.S. District Court judge rejected terms of a plea deal between defense attorneys and prosecutors that was met with passionate objections by Arbery’s parents.

Asked by U.S. District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood for his decision, McMichael said: “I withdraw the plea.”

His father, Greg McMichael, backed down from a plan to plead guilty in a legal filing late Thursday. Wood said jury selection in the hate crimes trial will begin Monday.

The McMichaels and a neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, were convicted of murder in a Georgia state court last fall and sentenced to life in prison. Georgia lacked a hate crimes law at the time of the killing. The U.S. Department of Justice had them indicted on charges that the three white men violated Arbery’s civil rights and targeted him because he was Black.

The McMichaels armed themselves and chased Arbery in a pickup truck after spotting the 25-year-old man running past their home just outside the port city of Brunswick on Feb. 23, 2020. Bryan joined the pursuit in his own truck and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael blasting Arbery with a shotgun.

The father and son had planned to plead guilty to a hate crime charge after prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed to propose a 30-year sentence that would include a request to transfer the McMichaels from Georgia’s state prison system to federal custody. The deal would have required the McMichaels to admit to racist motives and forfeit the right to appeal their federal sentence.

Wood rejected the deal Monday after Arbery’s parents argued that conditions in federal prison wouldn’t be as harsh. Wood said she ultimately denied the deal because it would have locked her into a specific sentence.

Prosecutors asked the judge to approve the plea deals despite the objections from Arbery's family. Prosecutor Tara Lyons said that attorneys for Arbery's parents had told the U.S. Justice Department that the family wouldn't object.

But Lee Merritt, an attorney for Arbery's mother, said the slain man's family had previously rejected the same terms and “no longer wanted to engage” with prosecutors, who "took that as a deferral.”

During the murder trial in state court, defense attorneys argued the McMichaels were justified in pursuing Arbery because they had a reasonable suspicion that he had committed crimes in their neighborhood. Travis McMichael testified that he opened fire with his shotgun after Arbery attacked him with fists and tried to grab the weapon.

The FBI recently released its most recent hate crime data that shows more than 10,000 people reported being the victim of a hate crime, the most during the last 12 years.

“I want people to understand that it happens all the time,” said one woman who wanted to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation for the hate that has been directed at her. “These people who you talk to every day and associate with every day; they don’t look at you as an equal. They definitely look at you like you’re lesser than them.”

This woman, who we will call Martha for the purpose of this story, is in her mid-30’s and is Hispanic. She says ever since she was young prejudice seeped into nearly every aspect of her life, and the pain has been felt generations deep.

“When my grandma was younger, she was born here in New Mexico. When she went to school, she would get beat for speaking Spanish. And so, she didn’t teach that to anybody in the family,” said Martha. “She and my grandpa decided not to teach anybody Spanish. So, I don’t know Spanish.”

“I was shoved into lockers. I was dumped upside down into trash cans. I was a rag doll for people,” added another woman, 52, who also wanted to remain anonymous.

Seven years ago, this woman who we will call Kelly for the purpose of this story, came out to her then-wife and told her she was transgender.

“It led to a violent assault,” she said. “If you’ve never had it happen it doesn’t seem as important but it’s like they’re trying to deliberately upset me, and it feels threatening and that happens periodically.”

Data supports what these women feel. A study by the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies found 68% of people who were the victim of hate speech or a hate crime said they experienced PTSD symptoms like numbing, avoidance, and re-experiencing.

The effects also go deeper since it is not just an attack on belief, it is one on identity.

“I would look in the mirror and say what the hell are you? It was like I didn’t believe in who I was,” said Kelly.

“When you’re younger, you don’t realize what’s going on and you feel bad about yourself. What can I do to change? What did I do?” said Martha. “But it took me being out on my own, and making my own friends, and living my own life to realize that it isn’t me. Whatever their problem is with me, and the way I look, and the way I was born, literally; it doesn’t have anything to do with me. It’s their own biases.”

It is there, that simple yet profound realization, where transformation can occur. It doesn’t always come, say these women. It took Kelly 35 years of suicidal ideations to understand it and Martha more than 20 years of living with fear. But when they got there, they said it was as if decades of trauma, inferiority, and pain began to slip away.

“What led me to where I am today is euphoria, bursts of euphoria that were very intense,” said Kelly. “I would just hit the ground crying because it was so powerful, and it was so beautiful.

Perhaps this is why we call those who endure this kind of hate: survivors.

“In a way, I feel it has kind of made me a better person because I don’t hold those same types of judgments toward people,” said Martha.

“There’s no way any of this harassment could drive me back. I’m stubborn and it only makes me more determined,” said Kelly. “It’s why I’m sitting here, because it only makes me more determined to push forward.”

WASHINGTON, D.C. — By a vote of 94-1, the United States Senate passed a limited but symbolically important piece of legislation addressing hate crimes against Asian Americans on Thursday.

The legislation creates a new position within the Department of Justice to expedite reviews of hate crimes, especially ones involving the COVID-19 pandemic.

The legislation also helps provide resources to local police departments so they can handle allegations of a hate crime more efficiently.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Thursday that the bill is "proof" that "the Senate can work to solve important issues" and would tell bigots "we're going after you."

New York Democratic Rep. Grace Meng and Hawaii Democratic Sen. Mazie Hirono were the primary sponsors of the legislation.

Because the bill was amended in the Senate, it now goes back to the House for a final vote. President Biden has said he would sign it.

GROWING PROBLEM

While hate crimes declined nationally in 2020 by 7%, hate crimes directed toward Asians spiked by more than 150%, according to the nonpartisan Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism.

In New York City in 2019, there were three reported incidents toward Asians reported to police. In 2020, 28 incidents were reported.

Most hate crimes go unreported, according to experts.