How Hate Crimes Have Risen With COVID-19 Spread

As we are bombarded with daily news and numbers of the COVID-19 virus and its effects, one aspect has be sidelined: the sharp rise in hate incidents particularly against Asian-Americans, LGBTQI+ people, and immigrants. These incidents represent a spike in an already worrisome trend of anti-LGBTQI+ animus.

Lecia Brooks, Chief Workplace Transformation Officer of the Southern Poverty Law Center, (SPLC) joins us today to discuss the issue and what can be done to fight it. Prior to her current role at SPLC, she previously served as the SPLC’s outreach director, where she traveled across the U.S. and abroad to counter hate and extremism and to promote the celebration of difference. 

"A significant factor fueling the frequency of this trend is the racist rhetoric of President Donald Trump," Lecia told the LA Blade Newspaper.

Trump has refused to refer to the virus and it accompanying pandemic by its given scientific label, instead referring to it as ‘the Chinese Virus,’ in press briefings and press photo opportunities. This has also caused some members of the West Wing staff to label it inaccurately and in a seemingly racist way. On March 17, CBS News White House correspondent Weijia Jang, a Chinese-American tweeted, “This morning a White House official referred to #Coronavirus as the “Kung Flu” to my face. Makes me wonder what they’re calling it behind my back,” she wrote.

Today, we unpack the hate...

With Co-host Brody Levesque.