New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio blamed “forces of white supremacy” for an attack on a group of Hasidic Jews in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, last month, even though the actual attackers were black.
“It’s really clear that forces of white supremacy have been unleashed,” the 2020 presidential candidate said. “A lot of folks used to be told it was unacceptable to be anti-Semitic, it was unacceptable to be racist and now they’re getting more permission.”
While it is true in some cases that hate crimes involve the narrative of the “angry white male” wreaking havoc on marginalized victims, the actual statistics of New York’s police department appear to tell another story.
In de Blasio’s own city, NYPD crime reports cite hate-crime victims as being “most frequently [w]hite” at 46.1% and hate crime suspects as “most frequently Black” at 55%.
NEW YORK, NY – OCTOBER 25: (L-R) NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York City Police Commissioner James ONeill exit a press conference regarding the recent package bombings, at NYPD headquarters, October 25, 2018 in New York City. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
From the NYPD’s analysis:
Hate crime victims are most frequently White (46.1%) while Black (24.7%) and Hispanic (20.1%) hate crime victims account for a significant portion of all hate crime victims. Asian/Pacific Islander hate crime victims (9.1%) account for the remaining portions of hate crime victims.
Hate crime suspects are most frequently Black (55.0%), White (23.6%) or Hispanic (20.0%). Asian/Pacific Islanders
accounted for (1.4%) of the remaining suspects.The hate crime arrest population is most frequently White (51.3%) or Black arrestees (44.7%). Asian/Pacific Islander arrestees (2.7%) and Hispanic (1.3%) account for the remaining portions of the hate crime arrest population.
Here are New York City’s current demographic estimates, according to World Population Review:
White: 42.78%
Black or African American: 24.32%
Other race: 15.12%
Asian: 14.00%
Two or more races: 3.33%
Native American: 0.40%
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander: 0.05%
In the first quarter of 2019, there were 49 total hate crime arrests: 25 arrestees were white (51% of hate crime arrests, 42.78% population), 17 were black (34.7% of hate crimes arrests, 24.32% of population), and five were Asian (10.2% of hate crime arrests, 14% of population).
Yearly 2018 statistics tell a similar tale. Of 151 total crimes resulting in arrest, 77 arrestees were white (51% of hate crime arrests, 42.78% population) and 67 were black (44.4% of hate crime arrests, 24.32% of the population). Only four of those arrested were of Asian ancestry. (RELATED: Reason Editor Explains How Hate Crime Statistics Are Misrepresented, Give Shocking Guess On How Many Are Actually Real)
It was unclear why only 23.6% of hate crime suspects were white while 51% of hate crime arrests were also white. Nevertheless, the breakdown of even white arrests for hate crimes as a percentage of the white population (51% vs 42.78%) is still lower than that for blacks (44.4% vs 24.32%).
The Daily Caller asked The Manhattan Institute’s Heather Mac Donald for some insight into why this could be:
If the NYPD characterizes domestic stalking and other types of non-violent domestic disputes as a hate crime based on gender — and I don’t know if this is the case — it would be easier to arrest suspects, since the suspect would be known. There may be more whites proportionally involved in non-violent domestic abuse than in stranger hate crimes, on the analogy with stranger street crime. A larger proportion of white committed homicides than black committed homicides are domestic violence, because whites are only negligibly involved in street crime. In New York City, for example, blacks are 72% of all shooting suspects, and whites less than 3%, though the black and white proportions of the city’s population are around 24% and 43%, respectively.
“But if non-violent domestic abuse were included in the hate crime category, you would expect to see a higher percentage of Hispanic suspects, since they have high rates of domestic violence,” she continued.
Mac Donald said she supposes “it’s possible” that police might decide not to characterize an assault as a hate crime after picking up a minority suspect but there’s “no evidence” to support such a claim: “I suppose that is possible, but I have no evidence for that. A portion of black-on-white street violence may have some element of contempt that rarely is acknowledged or charged. But that is a different matter. I wish I had an answer, but it is a very interesting discrepancy.”
The Daily Caller has reached out to NYPD for comment but did not receive an answer in time for publication.