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A spate of high-profile assaults on Asian Americans has renewed long-standing criticism from Democrats and civil rights groups that the U.S. government is vastly undercounting hate crimes, a problem that they say has grown more acute amid rising white nationalism and deepening racial strife. The attacks - including several in Northern California over the past month that attracted national attention - followed months of warnings from advocates that anti-China rhetoric from former president Donald Trump over the coronavirus pandemic was contributing to a surge in anti-Asian slurs and violence. Although President Biden last month signed an executive action banning the federal government from employing the sort of “inflammatory and xenophobic” language Trump used to describe the virus - such as “China plague” and “kung flu” - Asian American leaders said the recent attacks demonstrate a need for greater urgency in dealing with such threats.
The Justice Department’s efforts to report and track such incidents have been beset by incomplete and inconsistent data from the nation’s 18,000 local law enforcement agencies.