FBI: Anti-Muslim Hate Crimes in US Skyrocket in Last Year

Out of 5,850 reported incidents of hate crimes throughout the year, 57 percent were reportedly motivated by race or ethnicity, while 20 percent were said to be motivated by religious bias, according to new statistics released on Monday. Attacks based on sexual orientation accounted for 1,053 of the crimes.

Of those, 257 were against Muslims, up from 154 in 2014, making it the second-highest year after 2001, in which 481 hate crimes against followers of Islam were recorded.

"I think these statistics are just a fraction of what we see on the ground right now," Ibrahim Hooper, from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) stated, speaking on the current tensions surrounding the presidential election. "We witnessed a spark in the number of hate crimes against Muslims in late 2015, and this number increased further during Donald Trump's election campaign.”

Hooper stated that he expects this year’s number will be even higher, due to the president-elect stating that he intends to tighten immigration from Muslim nations that are known to be hot spots for terrorism.

"We expect the situation to get worse in the future, based on the fact that Donald Trump had mainstreamed Islamophobia."

Since the election, there have been reports of racial slurs and intimidation from supporters of Trump, as well as violence against those who voted for the president-elect. Several of the reports of hate crimes have been debunked by police as hoaxes, but more reports have been coming in every day as tensions continue to boil.

"We have no reason to believe things are going to get better for the American Muslim community or other minorities anytime soon,” Hooper stated.

Jewish people remain the most often targeted religious group according to the FBI statistics, making up 53 percent of all reported cases.