Civil and human rights nonprofit group Asian Americans Advancing Justice (AAAJ) has found a spike in anti-Asian hate crimes as a result of President Trump’s stance against China.
According to the Huffington Post, AAAJ has launched StandAgainstHatred.org, a website to track Anti-Asian hate crimes after noticing a “huge jump in anti-Chinese hate”.
President and Executive Director of AAAJ Los Angeles, Stewart Kwoh, said in a press release, “while hate crimes and incidents have surged to the top of news coverage leading up to and following the November 8th election, attacks against AAPIs have received little attention.”
The Huffington Post also cites a report on 2015 hate crimes from the LA County Commission on Human Relations that showed anti-Chinese crimes had tripled from six to 18 in that county alone.
AAAJ Los Angeles vice president of programs and communications Karin Wang suggests that the violence may have come as a result of President Trump describing China as the “economic enemy” in his campaign. “The announcement “really reinforces the dangerous foreign enemy image even though he describes China’s threat as one of trade.”
In 2015, Trump made an announcement in which he said, “ISIS, China, Mexico are all beating us,” before discussing China’s “exponentially expanding its military power.” Wang said the announcement “really reinforces the dangerous foreign enemy image, even though he describes China’s threat as one of trade”.
AAAJ’s new hate-tracker website encourages people of all backgrounds to report crimes or complaints that stem from factors including cultural identity, gender, sexual orientation, and religion. The website also encourages people to share stories of the experiences they have endured.
“The reality is people, at some point, become numb to numbers,” Wang told OC Register. “But they respond to the news and they respond to stories.”
