Response of Alma Adams (D-N.C.)

“Every day, people of color, immigrants, members of the LGBTQ community and far too many others experience discrimination, intimidation, harassment, and violence. Hate, both speech and crimes, endures in America. The President has normalized hate speech with his racist bullying and xenophobic vitriol. According to the most recent FBI statistics, hate crimes are increasing across the country, including a 12 percent increase right here in North Carolina. This reflects a dangerous rise in white supremacist terrorism that threatens all of us. Congress can and must play a role to address the increase in hate crimes. We can do that by exercising oversight over the Department of Justice (DOJ), ensuring that they’re enforcing federal hate crime laws and aggressively prosecuting white supremacist violence. We can allocate more resources to state and local law enforcement agencies to accurately track and report hate crimes, and we can continue to speak out against hateful, racist rhetoric and actions.”