New York State Police will expand the scale of their monitoring of “negativity” and “hate speech” online, as part of Gov. Kathy Hochul’s $75 million plan to tackle the rise in “hate crimes” related to the Middle Eastern war.
“We’ve not seen this level of hate crimes and fear since Sept. 12, 2001,” Ms. Hochul said at a news conference on Monday, following an emergency meeting with the state’s Jewish community leaders and local and federal law enforcement officials.
“It’s painful to see the cruelty with which New Yorkers are treating each other. Everywhere from college campuses, to our streets, to schools, to playgrounds; even as they’re entering their houses of worship,” the Democrat governor said, noting that the increase in hate crimes “began instantaneously” as Hamas terrorists launched a brutal attack on Israel.
The state will be spending $75 million to address this issue, Ms. Hochul said, including $50 million for local law enforcement to “beef up their efforts,” as well as $25 million in security grants.
This funding, according to the governor, will allow State Police officers who have been “embedded with local law enforcement” to expand their efforts in monitoring “what’s being said on social media platforms.”
“We’re very focused on the data we’re collecting from surveillance effort,” Ms. Hochul explained. “We have launched an effort to be able to counter some of the negativity and reach out to people when we see hate speech being spoken about on online platforms.”
“Our social media analysis unit has ramped up its monitoring of sites to catch incitement to violence, direct threats to others,” she continued, claiming that this is necessary for her administration to fulfill its commitment to make “New Yorkers feel safe.”
“I want everyone to know this phone number,” Ms. Hochul said, adding that she has directed law enforcement to run down and investigate “every single complaint.” She also promised prosecutions for those who have “crossed the line from hate speech into a hate crime.”
“We need the public to step forward,” she said in a call to action. “Here in New York City we’ve had a huge spike in anti-Semitic incidences. I know that they’re underreported. Hate crimes against Muslims are also being underreported. That is not how we can deal with them.”
In the meantime, State Police troopers have been deployed to places that “could be susceptible to hate crimes or violence,” particularly synagogues, yeshivas, and mosques. The governor also said an additional $2.5 million will be allocated for at least 10 State Police investigators to work with an FBI counterterrorism task force.
“By having State Police investigators embedded with every operation, every FBI counter terrorism effort throughout the state. It’s a large state, we have to make sure that they know we have the full support of the State Police behind them,” Ms. Hochul told reporters. “Now the counter terrorism squads in New York, Buffalo, Albany, Rochester will all have State Police investigators.”
The governor’s comments on Monday came weeks after she visited Cornell University, where a third-year student was arrested and charged for allegedly making threats of violence against his Jewish peers.
The student, Patrick Dai, allegedly posted in an online student discussion board threats to bring a rifle and “shoot up” a kosher dining hall next to the Ivy League school’s Jewish living center, according to federal prosecutors. He also allegedly threatened to “stab” and “slit the throat” of any Jewish man, to rape and throw off a cliff any Jewish woman, and to behead any Jewish baby he sees on campus.
“If you’re going to engage in these harmful actions, hate crimes, breaking our laws, you will be caught and you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” Hochul said during her Oct. 30 visit to the Ithaca, New York, campus.
“I want them to know they’re not alone, that they have the state of New York backing them,” she said of Cornell’s Jewish students.
In New York City, which is home to more Jews than Tel Aviv and Jerusalem combined, the number of anti-Semitic incidents has jumped since the Israel–Hamas war broke out, the city’s police department said.
Over the past month, some 69 “bias incidents” in New York City were referred to as “anti-Jewish” by the police, compared to 22 incidents in the same month last year.
