The number of hate crimes on UW-Madison’s campus more than doubled from 2022 to 2023, from six to 14. That’s according to the campus’ 2023 Clery report, a federally mandated report of campus crime statistics.
For the report’s purposes, a hate crime is a “criminal offense committed against a person or property which is motivated, in whole or in part, by the offender’s bias.” The crimes comprise two assaults, 10 counts of intimidation (six of which were committed at one time by the same person), one count of vandalism and one count of property destruction. Religion, national origin and race were cited as bias motivators in all the crimes.
Marc Lovicott, UW Police Department executive director of communications, says the increase contains “a bit of an anomaly.” Clery reports count victims, not incidents, he says, and during a November incident when a 20-year old man threatened a group of female students with racist anti-Arab and anti-Asian comments, there were six victims.
“So it was counted six times,” Lovicott says in an email statement. “While we never want hate crimes — or any crimes — to occur, given that anomaly, our numbers are largely unchanged year to year.”
There were still eight more victims compared to 2022. Even if only incidents are counted, four more incidents were committed in 2023 (9) than in 2022 (5). Lovicott says the increase could come from the university better promoting its hate and bias reporting form. Even if a report is only submitted to UW-Madison, not UWPD, it is still counted in the Clery report — UWPD directly received four hate crime reports in 2022, and five in 2023, Lovicott says.
Hate crimes are becoming an increasingly frequent presence on college campuses. Nationally, hate crimes against college students increased 38% between 2018 and 2022, according to a January 2024 F.B.I. report, with Black students being the most common victims, followed by Jewish students and LGBTQ+ students.
Recent events have sparked lingering tension on campus. Many students remain bitterly divided on Israel’s war in Gaza. Others still reel from a May 2023 viral video that depicted a white female UW-Madison student spouting racist anti-Black slurs — the video prompted widespread protests across campus. In November 2023, neo-Nazis marched toward the Capitol and were near campus. Those recent events prompted the Associated Students of Madison (ASM), UW-Madison’s student government, to request revisions to the university’s hate and bias reporting form in December 2023.
Landis Varughese, ASM vice chair, views 2023’s increase in hate crimes as “heart wrenching.” He would like to see more staff hired to respond to hate and bias incidents and educate the campus community about them.
“The fact that we saw an increase in actual federally defined hate crimes on campus is really indicative of a larger issue,” Varughese says, adding that there’s a high likelihood there are other incidents that didn’t qualify for reporting. He also worries about underreporting, a phenomenon particularly prominent in hate crime reporting. Experts say complex reporting criteria, fear of reprisal and distrust toward police mean the hate crime statistics the F.B.I. and other law enforcement agencies report are significantly lower than the actual total of hate crimes committed.
“Maybe you’re worried that nothing will be done about this report. Maybe you’re worried about having to reshare that story with individuals or decision makers who can perhaps do something about your situation,” Varughese says. “I feel like there’s a feeling of a lack of [institutional] support when they go in and report on these experiences.”
Reports of anti-Arab, anti-Muslim and antisemitic hate crimes, in particular, have surged since Oct. 7, the day that Hamas killed around 1,200 Israelis in a terrorist attack. Since then, Israel has killed at least 41,431 Palestinians in its war in Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which is run by Hamas. Protests over Israel’s carnage in Gaza have roiled universities, including UW-Madison, and prompted increased attention toward hate crimes and incidents toward Jewish, Arabic and Muslim students alike.
Such crimes have prompted action from groups like New Jersey nonprofit JewBelong, which is advertising on three billboards around the Madison area throughout October. “Dear colleges, American kids are afraid. Do your job!,” one billboard on John Nolen Drive proclaims.
“A number of Jewish organizations are speaking up against the hate but there needs to be more voices in the conversation. Schools need to do better and Jewish students deserve to be safe on campus,” JewBelong cofounder Archie Gottesman said in a Sept. 30 statement.
