SPLC Blames Trump For Latest Spike In Hate Groups

NPR reports:

For the fourth year in a row, the Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights organization that tracks hate groups, reports that hate and domestic extremism are rising in an unabated trend.

The center found a 30 percent increase in U.S. hate groups over the past four years and a 7 percent increase in hate groups in 2018 alone, according to the center’s annual “Year in Hate and Extremism” report. The group designated 1,020 organizations as hate groups in 2018, a high of at least 20 years.

The watchdog group blames President Trump, his administration, right-wing media outlets and the ease of spreading hate on social media platforms for the alarming increase. The growth, it says, is largely driven by “hysteria over losing a white-majority nation to demographic change.”

See the SPLC’s new interactive hate map here.