Milpitas #StopAsianHate Rally Planned This Weekend

MILPITAS, CA — Demonstrators will convene at rallies across the Bay Area this weekend to condemn anti-Asian acts of hate.

A Milpitas event will be held from 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday. Demonstrators will start at Lee's Sandwich (279 W. Calaveras Blvd.), organizers said.

The public is invited to bring signs. Demonstrators will decry hate crimes and anti-Asian hate, and call for justice and equal rights for all.

Some 3,800 acts of hate were reported against Asian Americans from March 19, 2020 to February 28, 2021, according to San Francisco-based organization Stop AAPI Hate, which tracks hate incidents targeting Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.

About 70 percent of those incidents involved verbal harassment and 10 percent involved physical violence, while another 20 percent involved shunning or deliberate avoidance. Women are more than two times more likely to report acts of hate, according to Stop AAPI Hate.

The call to #StopAsianHate movement has grown louder in recent days, after six Asian women working in spas were killed in a string of Atlanta shootings.

While U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Wray said in an initial assessment that the attacks do not appear to have been racially motivated, U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) has called on officials to take a closer look at whether race was a factor in the shooter's rampage, Reuters reported.