California releases 2024 hate crime report: 4 key facts

California releases 2024 hate crime report

A new report from the state of California shows hate crimes have gone up slightly from the year before.

LOS ANGELES - California released its annual report on hate crimes, showing that hate crimes across the state are slightly up from the year before. 

But there are plenty of other trends to look at from the data. Here are just a few of the big ones.

1. Hate crimes are up across California, slightly

Big picture view:

According to the DOJ's report, there were 2,023 hate crimes across California last year. That's a jump of just under 3% from the year before, but still lower than the state's 10-year high in 2022.

2. Who is being targeted by hate crimes?

Why you should care:

The state also tracks these hate crimes by which group was being targeted. 

Still, in 2024, the overwhelming majority of hate crimes in California are race-based. Hate crimes against California's Black community made up for nearly a quarter of all hate crimes in the state in 2024, despite the total number dropping from the year prior.

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Crimes against the state's Jewish, Latino, and LGBTQ+ communities also rose last year. Over the last decade, hate crimes against the Jewish and transgender communities have increased by more than 200%. Anti-Asian hate crimes also dropped for the third straight year. 

3. Los Angeles leads the state in hate crimes, by a mile

Local perspective:

Los Angeles, and LA County by association, perhaps unsurprisingly, had the most hate crimes in the state in 2024. But it may surprise you just how much more LA had than the next biggest city.

There were just over 540 hate crimes in the city of LA in 2024, the state report said. That's more than double the number of hate crimes reported in every other county in the state. For comparison, LA's population is about triple that of San Diego, the next biggest city in the state, but LA had 11 times as many hate crimes as San Diego last year (46).

4. But, LA County saw a massive drop in hate crimes

In 2023, LA County officials were sounding the alarm over what they called an "unprecedented" number of hate crimes, with more than 1,300 reports, an all-time high.

But there's good news for LA County. Across the county, there were 771 hate crime incidents in 2024, according to the state's numbers. That's a nearly 43% drop from 2023 to 2024. Now, the state's report does not include numbers from the city of Downey, but unless Downey saw nearly 600 hate crimes last year (more than Los Angeles), the drop countywide would still be pretty big.

Hate crimes in LA County reach record highs

Hate crimes in Los Angeles County went up more than 40% in 2023, to the highest level since the county started tracking the data in 1980.

The California Department of Justice 2024 Hate Crime Report can be found by tapping or clicking here.