And it's confirmed by the FBI.

Backstory: Right-wingers like Andrew Breitbart and Glenn Beck claim SEIU union reps who were recently slapped on the wrist for “misdemeanor ordinance violations” in connection with an August altercation outside a town hall health care forum, ought to face “hate crime” charges for allegedly beating up Kenneth Gladney.

But as I noted earlier:

Meaning, Gladney, a black man, was allegedly punched by [Elston] McCowan, a black man, and now Breitbart and Beck want prosecutors to file hate-crime charges because McCowan was prejudiced against Gladney's race; because McCowan's assault was driven by his hatred of Gladney's race. That, despite the fact that Gladney and McCowan share the same race.

It made no sense that a black man would be charged with a hate crime for hitting another black man, even if the accused used a racial epithet just prior to the scuffle.

And what do you know, the FBI agrees. From its “Hate Crimes Data Collection Guidelines,” the FBI cautions law enforcement about certain extenuating circumstances [emphasis added]:

2. Misleading Facts — Agencies must be alert to misleading facts. For example,
the offender used an epithet to refer to the victim's race, but the offender and victim were of the same race.

According to the FBI, if the victim and the offender are “of the same race” than hate crime charges should not be brought.

UPDATED: Breitbart sure does have a tough time trying to decipher the law.

UPDATED: With all that right-wing funding, you'd think Breirtbart would put an attorney at retainer so his site wouldn't keep making these embarrassing gaffes.

Then again it's quite possible Breitbart's staff knows that it's wrong about the law and purposefully publishes falsehoods any way. After all, we are talking about conservative “journalism.”