A Muslim woman wearing a religious headscarf was harassed on the subway by three men who allegedly called her a terrorist and chanted "Donald Trump" to her, police say.
Police are searching for those men, who allegedly targeted the Long Island woman on the 23rd Street subway station serving the 6 line at about 10 p.m. Thursday.
The suspect walked up to the woman, who was wearing a hijab, and began chanting, "Donald Trump! Donald Trump! F****** terrorist, get out of this country, you don't belong here," according to police.
The men got on the northbound 6 train with the woman when it pulled into the station, and the woman moved to the back of the train, police said. The men eventually moved toward her, again yelling "terrorist, get out of this country."
One of the men grabbed the woman's bag, breaking one of the straps, police said.
The woman told police she responded to the men, "What the f*** do you want?" and moved away again. When she got off the train at Grand Central, the men yelled after her, "Get the f****** hijab off your head!," according to police.
The woman reported the incident to police at Grand Central. She told them the men, who were white, appeared intoxicated. There was no other immediate description of the suspects, and police are canvassing for surveillance video.
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In a Facebook post late Friday night, the victim spoke out about the attack.
"It breaks my heart that so many individuals chose to be bystanders while watching me get harassed (sic) verbally and physically by these disgusting pigs," she wrote.
The NYPD said last week that bias incidents in New York City have spiked 400 percent in the two weeks since Trump was elected president compared to the same period last year. NYPD Commissioner James O'Neill, however, stopped short of saying that Trump's victory played a role in what he described as a troubling trend.
Demonstrators outraged over the recent attacks gathered in Jackson Heights Friday night, calling it a "hate-free zone."
"We're horrified by the incident in and of itself," Afaf Nasher of the Council on American Islamic Relations said of the subway harassment of the Muslim woman. "Anyone going through some kind of attack is absolutely unacceptable. But then you feel this overwhelming empathy because we know that this is not the only person who has been assaulted in mass transit, but also on streets."
There are "swastikas showing up, people who are dressed wearing religious garb being targeted," said Nasher. "We're seeing it on every level from young kids in school to adults in the streets."
Stefan Holt contributed to this report
