In California’s Alameda County, a Chinese American man was screamed at while mowing his lawn. The local prosecutor said the man was told to get out of America.

In neighboring Santa Clara County, a Vietnamese couple was threatened while in a grocery store. Officials said the man turned his hand into the shape of a gun.

In New York City, people of Asian descent were assaulted, kicked, pushed and accosted on subway trains. The theme: This virus is your fault.

People of Asian descent have reported being shunned, verbally abused, name-called, coughed and spat on, even physically assaulted as the coronavirus pandemic continues to upend American life. As the political rhetoric blaming China for the pandemic escalates, law enforcement officials and human rights advocates have seen an increasing number of hate crimes and incidents of harassment and discrimination against Asian Americans.

(Reuters) - The number of victims in anti-Latino or Hispanic hate crimes rose over 21% in 2018, the FBI reported on Tuesday, and attacks overall are increasingly targeting people instead of property.

The data coincides with an ongoing debate over U.S. President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policies and follows the August mass shooting at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, when the suspected gunman told police he was targeting Mexicans.

“We’re seeing the swapping of one derided group in the social-political arena for another,” said Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino. “Attacks against Muslims peaked around 2016 when terrorism was the concern. Now immigration is the No. 1 issue and Latinos are being targeted.”

There were 671 victims in anti-Latino or Hispanic incidents in 2018, compared with 552 the year before, the FBI said in its annual Hate Crime Statistics report.