A new list of states with the largest number of hate groups places Georgia in the top 10. But what places it in that category might come as a surprise.
Compiling statistics from the Southern Poverty Law Center, the website 24/7 Wall St. released the numbers on Friday which ranked Georgia ninth. According to the ranking, which figures in the total number of hate groups with the total population of the state, Georgia was ranked ninth in the nation.
While white nationalist groups like Identity Evropa and the Klu Klux Klan are represented in the list, the compiled list reports that of the 40 active hate groups in the state, 40 percent are designated as Black Nationalist ideologies.
Examples of these groups active in Georgia are the Nation of Islam, the New Black Panther Party and the Nuwaubian Nation of Moors.
According to 24/7 Wall St., the latter of these groups actually moved to Georgia from New York in the 1990s, setting up a "Egyptian-style" compound in Putnam County with 400 members on-site and about 1,000 in the surrounding county.
Despite the fact that the compound was shut down and its founder arrested on charges of child molestation among other crimes, the group survives in chapters and bookstores called All Eyes on Egipt.
According to the data, the state actually has the fourth lowest percentage of people identifying as white (58.7 percent) and the sixteenth highest percent of the population which is foreign born (10.1 percent).
Only eight states rated higher than Georgia on this bad list including Arkansas, Oregon, Virginia, Indiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Idaho.
Overall, the SPLC reports that hate groups have seen a steady rise over the last several years with a boom from 784 in 2014 to 954 in 2017. The SPLC blames social tensions and rhetoric in Washington for the explosion. While listed throughout the country, many of the groups are clustered in a handful of states in the West and the South.
Georgia is one of only ten listed with more than 10 hate groups and at least 3.8 hate groups per 1 million residents.
