call your senator to support the hate crimes prevention act

Got this time-sensitive action alert from OCA forwarded along to me, regarding important hate crimes legislation currently in the Senate. The important thing is for you to call your Senator today between 9:00 am and 5:00 pm EST and urge support for the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act (S. 909). Read on for details:

End Hate Crimes Now! Pass S 909!

CALL YOUR SENATORS!

Wednesday, July 15

Call your Senator toll free at 866-659-9641 today between 9:00 am and 5:00 pm EST and urge support for the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Hate Crimes Prevention Act (S. 909).

Current law limits federal involvement in hate crimes cases to those involving crimes motivated by race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin. This Act will expand this law to include crimes that are motivated by a victim's actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability. It will give federal government jurisdiction to prosecute hate crimes in states where current law is inadequate and also provide greater access and grants to assist federal authorities to investigate hate crimes.

For APAs, the murder of Vincent Chin in 1982 still resonates throughout the community. Vincent, a Chinese American man, was beaten to death by two autoworkers who blamed Asians for the economic woes of U.S. autoworkers. Twenty-seven years later, Thanh Hong, a Vietnamese American student was assaulted and had racial epithets yelled at him when walking past a fraternity house. Thanh suffered a facial laceration requiring several stitches. Although Vincent's murder galvanized the APA community to launch its first nationwide pan-ethnic movement to stop anti-Asian violence and hate crimes, Thanh's case reminds us how much more needs to be done to stop these crimes from occurring.

The Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act is a comprehensive and measured response to a problem that continues to plague our nation - violence motivated by prejudice. These crimes are especially destructive because their perpetrators seek not only to harm the immediate victim, but to make a statement to an entire community.

OCA joins other civil rights, religious, law enforcement, professional and civic organizations in supporting this Act. Call your Senator now and help put an end to hate crimes!

I can't find it anywhere on the OCA National website, but you can find the original posting here. Like it says, while it would be nice to think that hate crimes like the Vincent Chin murder are a thing of the past, but as recent incidents have shown, hate crimes are alive and kicking in a serious way. If you can, call your Senator to support this act.