The number of hate crime incidents reported to the FBI decreased slightly from 2017 to 2018, according to the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program’s annual Hate Crime Statistics report, released today.

Law enforcement reported 7,120 hate crimes to the FBI’s UCR Program last year, down slightly from the 7,175 incidents reported the previous year.

There were 7,036 single-bias hate crimes reported to UCR in 2018. From those incidents, there were 8,646 victims.

The majority of the reported hate crimes were motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry bias (59.6 percent). Additional biases included religion (18.7 percent), sexual orientation (16.7 percent), gender identity (2.2 percent), disability (2.1 percent), and gender (0.7 percent).

The report, Hate Crime Statistics, 2018, includes hate crime information for last year. The data is broken down by location, offenders, bias types, and victims.

More than 16,000 law enforcement agencies reported their hate crime statistics to the FBI last year. The FBI has been working with law enforcement across the country to encourage reporting of hate crime statistics. Reporting hate crime data to the UCR Program helps the public and researchers gain a more accurate picture of hate crimes. It also allows law enforcement to develop data-focused approaches to combating hate crimes.

Hate crimes are the highest investigative priority of the FBI’s civil rights program.

Full report: Hate Crime Statistics, 2018﻿

