Hate acts are a significant public health issue with wide-ranging negative impacts for individuals and communities, yet the true extent to which hate impacts Californians is underexplored. This policy brief uses data from the 2023 and 2024 California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) to report both survey-based prevalence estimates (what respondents reported experiencing) and model-based predicted probabilities (that is, predicted rates of experiencing hate) to describe how experiences of hate can vary across populations and regions.

Findings: Between 2022 and 2024, an estimated 1 in 11 (9%) Californians ages 12 and older had experienced acts of hate in the past year. Nearly every group that has been historically targeted by hate continues to experience disproportionate rates of hate acts in California:  26% of transgender or gender-expansive people, 20% of adults who reported unstable housing, 18% of Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander people, 16% of Black people, and 16% of sexually diverse Californians (e.g., lesbian, gay, bisexual, pansexual, or another nonheterosexual identity)The predicted rate of experiencing hate varied by region for several groups historically targeted by hate, among them communities of color, sexually diverse and gender-diverse individuals, and those reporting unstable housing.