US saw 8,400 hate crimes in 2017, says FBI

Over 8,400 hate crime incidents, including 24 against Sikhs, 15 against Hindus and over 300 against Muslims, were reported in the US in 2017, according to an FBI report. The report tops with 1,678 hate crimes committed against the Jews. In all, as many as 8,437 hate crimes were recorded in 2017. Nine anti-Buddhist hate crimes were also registered last year, the report said.

The Sikh Coalition, a community-based organisation that defends Sikh civil rights, said that in 2017, it received 12 anti-Sikh hate crime cases and tracked a total of 24 anti-Sikh hate-related incidents nationwide. “This figure alone is under-representative of the problem since many individuals impacted by hate do not report the incidents,” it said.

There are approximately 500,000 Sikhs in the US. In the wake of the 2012 Oak Creek, Wisconsin massacre inside a gurdwara, the FBI finally agreed to begin tracking anti-Sikh hate crimes in 2015.