Number of Active Hate Groups Up!

Check out the Law Librarian blog for a story about a new report from the Southern Poverty Law Center, showing that the number of hate groups operating in the United States has grown to 888. That’s a 5 percent increase since last year and a staggering 48 percent increase since 2000. The increase has been driven largely by anti-immigrant hysteria.

According to the new report, since the spring of 2005, some 300 new immigration restriction groups, including border vigilantes like the Minutemen and organizations that exist simply to harass Latino immigrants, have sprung up across the country. Of that number, 144 are listed as “nativist extremist” groups — organizations that do not merely seek to change immigration policy, but actively confront or harass individuals who they believe are undocumented.

KJ