Many recall a history of hate in the Inland Empire, from its outpost of Ku Klux Klan members in the 1920s to the exclusion and harassment that people from LGBTQ+, Asian, Latino and Black communities still face decades later.
Today, Inland community leaders are continuing to fight against hate and discrimination.
They called for change Tuesday, July 16, during a panel discussion titled “How Does the Inland Empire Strike Back Against Hate?” The event at UC Riverside was hosted by Zócalo Public Square, part of Arizona State University’s Media Enterprise, and California Humanities.
The latest hate crime report from the California Department of Justice shows that overall hate crimes in the state were down last year from the previous year, but hate reported against the LGBTQ+, Jewish and Muslim communities rose in 2023.
The department reported 137 hate crimes in Riverside and San Bernardino counties over the past two years, officials said.
San Bernardino County had 28 hate crimes in 2023, a number officials said could be unreliable because of data issues with some police agencies. Rialto had the most, with six reported crimes, while Redlands and Chino both had four.
Riverside County saw 35 hate crimes last year, with the highest number — 11 — reported in Palm Springs. Riverside had nine; Temecula saw two.
Assemblymember Corey Jackson, D-Perris; Black Voice News project director Candice Mays; and community organizer Luis Nolasco; joined panel moderator Brian Levin, founding director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at Cal State San Bernardino and a retired professor; for the conversation.
Jackson said the Inland Empire is “not doing enough” to fight growing hate and called on fellow state leaders to take action.
“We have to remember the history of the Inland Empire and this rise of hate, to me, shows me that it’s going back to its roots — we have to do all that we can to fight,” Jackson said. “We have to start building anti-racist institutions (to bring) knowledge, training and advocacy.”
Jackson mentioned his co-authoring of AB 1078, which prohibits the banning of textbooks in the state, and called the Inland region “ground zero” for such actions.
Last year in Temecula, the school board rejected an elementary social studies curriculum with supplemental materials that referenced the late LGBTQ+ leader Harvey Milk, after two board members called Milk a “pedophile.” Gov. Gavin Newsom threatened to send textbooks to Temecula and use the bill’s provisions to fine the Temecula Valley Unified School District if the board did not approve the curriculum. School trustees eventually adopted it.
In 2023, Murrieta school board members rejected an 11th-grade social studies textbook after some trustees said it contained elements of “critical race theory” and negatively portrayed former President Donald Trump.
He also referenced the “anti-outing legislation” that Newsom signed Monday, July 15, that prohibits California schools from disclosing a student’s gender identity to their parents.
Several Inland school districts, including Murrieta Valley, Temecula Valley and Chino Valley, OK’d transgender notification policies in the past year. Chino Valley Unified schools sued the state Tuesday, July 16, to challenge the new law.
Mays, director of Mapping Black California, a project of the Inland-based Black Voice News, criticized what she called the lack of thorough reporting of hate crimes by police agencies and the mistrust of law enforcement that can lead to among the Black community and other communities of color.
“In learning about the history of the Inland Empire, and hearing the stories of hate that Black residents have experienced, it’s not always violent or verbal — it’s often what someone didn’t do,” Mays said. “The first hurdle to reporting hate crimes is ‘How do you tell the police on the police?’ … It’s either not reported, or reported incompletely.”
Mays pointed out a challenge unique to fighting hate crimes: that the Inland Empire — which covers more than 27,000 square miles and has 4 million residents — is huge.
Panelists also discussed the importance of collaboration amid growing divisions in a heated political year and continuing world conflicts.
“We’re all on the menu, so if we band together, we can actually overcome our common oppressors,” Jackson said. “In our fight against hate, we cannot adopt hateful practices ourselves. We are seeing this in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
Zócalo Public Square is planning other events to fight hateful rhetoric. More information is on its website.
Any victim or witness to a hate incident or crime can report them online at CAvsHate.org, by calling 833-866-4283, or 1-833-8-NO-HATE; Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Residents can also call 211 for help in more than 200 languages.
