Minnesota state Rep. Walter Hudson has taken aim at a bill that would update the way the state government responds to and tracks “hate and bias incidents,” in which no crime may have actually been committed, calling it “problematic.”
The bill, HF 181, was first introduced in January this year by Rep. Samantha Vang, a member of the Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party, in an attempt to address what she said are “hate and bias incidents” that have soared during the COVID-19 pandemic against “Black Indigenous and people of color communities including Asian Americans.”
Under the bill, Minnesota’s “peace officers” would receive extra training to identify, respond to, and report crimes “motivated by bias.”
Additionally, the bill would allow community organizations, school districts, charter schools, and individuals to report crimes that they believe are “motivated by the victim’s or another’s actual or perceived race, color, ethnicity, religion, sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, national origin, marital status, status with regard to public assistance, familial status, or disability.”
Such crimes could also be reported over the victim’s “actual or perceived association with another person or group of a certain actual or perceived race, color, ethnicity, religion, sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, national origin, or disability.”
The bill would allow data to be reported and developed on the nature and extent of the crimes motivated by bias.
Such crimes typically fall outside of the hate crimes that are collected and reported annually by the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, according to the St. Cloud Times.
Bill Language Is ‘Problematic’
However, Hudson told Fox News Digital that he is concerned about “problematic” language in the bill that refers not only to race but also to sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender…
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