Neo-Nazis targeted a majority-Black town. Locals launched an armed watch.

Washington Post

27-02-2025

For weeks, men carrying rifles have guarded the roads leading into Lincoln Heights, Ohio, stopping and questioning those who approach the Cincinnati suburb.
The men, some of whom wear masks and body armor, are residents of this small, majority-Black town. They say they're protecting their own. And they're on edge.
In early February, a truck of neo-Nazis came to Lincoln Heights's doorstep. Masked demonstrators — some carrying rifles — hurled racist slurs and waved flags with red swastikas on a highway overpass leading into town.
Two weeks later, on Sunday, another agitator struck, spreading racist pamphlets from the Ku Klux Klan across Lincoln Heights.
'You get punched,' said Alandes Powell, 62, a nonprofit director who lives near the town. 'And someone comes and punches you again.'
The people of Lincoln Heights are used to fighting for themselves. The town originated as a self-governing Black community — the oldest north of the Mason-Dixon Line, it proclaims on its website — that lacked public services. For years, residents have complained of underinvestment and neglect. But the past few weeks have been different. Residents say they are distraught after being surrounded by hate and suspicious of police officers whom county officials criticized for not cracking down on the neo-Nazi march.
Many of the town's residents are adamant that taking up arms is the only solution, even as some have questioned whether they want their neighbors taking advantage of Ohio's open-carry law to begin an armed watch program.
'An American individual protecting his homeland with a firearm — I thought that was the most American thing that we [could] do,' said Daronce Daniels, a spokesman for the newly formed Lincoln Heights Safety and Watch Program, which coordinates the guards.
Lincoln Heights originated in the 1920s as a Black enclave for laborers blocked from Cincinnati and surrounding towns because of their race, according to the Cincinnati Preservation Association. The new village lacked adequate street lighting and fire and police departments. A nearby city pushed back when Lincoln Heights attempted to incorporate and establish municipal services; by the time it did in 1946, it had lost much of its tax base to neighboring communities.
Residents are proud of their history. And they say Lincoln Heights, now a town of about 3,000, continues to be neglected. Its police department was disbanded in 2014; the area is served by the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office. It took a years-long campaign to get the county to relocate a nearby Cincinnati Police Department gun range that regularly sent the crack of gunshots echoing through the streets.
But the community never imagined staring down a neo-Nazi march. Around 2 p.m. on Feb. 7, a U-Haul van brought a group of at least a dozen neo-Nazi demonstrators to a highway overpass near the village border. The agitators wore body armor, carried AR-15 rifles and waved swastika flags. They arrived as children were being let out from class at Lincoln Heights Elementary School and marched just blocks away.
'The way I found out that the Nazis were in my neighborhood was through children,' said DeRonda Calhoun, 45, a teacher who lives in Lincoln Heights. 'They were afraid.'
The demonstrators left after a large group of Lincoln Heights residents showed up to counterprotest. But the incident sparked outrage — at the neo-Nazis and at sheriff's officers and the neighboring Evendale police who responded to the march.
Residents, joined by Hamilton County Commissioner Alicia Reece, questioned why law enforcement made no citations or arrests during the incident after allegations that the neo-Nazi group had intimidated residents and made racist threats. Evendale police released body-camera footage of an officer appearing to act cordially with the demonstrators after they left the area, advising one man to change his shirt before driving him back to the site of the confrontation, where Lincoln Heights residents lingered, to retrieve a personal vehicle.
The Evendale Police Department did not respond to a request for comment. Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey called the neo-Nazis 'cowards' in a news conference and pledged to boost patrols in Lincoln Heights and investigate further.
Both agencies said that, though the demonstrators engaged in legally protected free speech, officers ordered the demonstrators to leave and prioritized de-escalating a dangerous situation.
That wasn't enough for some in Lincoln Heights.
'When we saw that the police wasn't helping us, every able-bodied man in the neighborhood, with or without a gun, has stood guard and has been standing guard ever since,' said Dominic Brewton Jr., who runs a maintenance and repair company in the town.
Residents took up arms shortly after the neo-Nazis left, and community leaders formed the Lincoln Heights Safety and Watch Program to organize them, according to Daniels, the group's spokesman. The program coordinates about 70 guards who watch the roads leading into Lincoln Heights and patrol the streets. Members kept watch when Lincoln Heights residents organized a protest last week, and they have flanked organizers who've spoken at community meetings.
The group assembled so quickly in Lincoln Heights because of the community's history of self-advocacy, said Carlton Collins, 36.
'In some ways, it's muscle memory for us,' he said.
Some have complained about armed men stopping people attempting to enter the village and asking about their intentions, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer. A local business owner told the Enquirer that an armed man who claimed to be 'protecting Lincoln Heights' pointed a gun at him when he asked the man to leave a vacant lot he owned.
Sheriff McGuffey said last week that she did not support creating a 'neighborhood militia.' Sheriff's office spokesperson Kyla Woods said Wednesday that the department received 911 calls about armed residents but only two documented reports of confrontations.
'There have been no charges of the armed residents, who are not breaking any laws by open carrying in Ohio,' Woods said. 'We do not intend to investigate any armed person unless a crime is committed.'
Daniels rejected suggestions that the group was a militia or practicing vigilantism. He said that reports of some armed men who challenged passersby were about residents not affiliated with the Safety and Watch Program and who acted alone in the days following the neo-Nazi march. The program directs members to report suspicious activity to the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office, he said.
'The only thing that's happening is that these Americans are protecting their community against Nazis,' he said.
Other Lincoln Heights residents echoed support for the guards. Julian Cook, pastor of the Lincoln Heights Missionary Baptist Church, said those he encountered were respectful.
'I pass them daily as I head to and fro,' he said. 'And it's important to remember that they have arisen out of a need.'
Powell, the nonprofit director, said the town had the right to set up a service for its protection.
'Lincoln Heights is saying, if you're not going to protect us, then we're going to protect ourselves,' she said.
As Lincoln Heights battens down, anger over the law enforcement response to the rally continues to simmer. Residents, backed by Mayor Ruby Kinsey, called for residents and other supporters to boycott nearby Evendale's businesses until the town completes an investigation into its police force and fires any officers who aided the demonstrators. The village of Evendale, which set up a dedicated landing page on its website to document its response to the rally, commissioned an independent investigation of its police department last week.
Kinsey and Evendale Mayor Richard Finan did not respond to requests for comment.
The Hamilton County prosecuting attorney's office is reviewing the neo-Nazi rally to determine whether it will make criminal charges but said it would take time to complete a thorough assessment given the volume of evidence, according to spokesperson Josh Hamblin.
Daniels said the Lincoln Heights guards will continue patrolling their village for the foreseeable future. They feel they are still under threat. On Sunday, residents woke up to discover leaflets with racist language from the Ku Klux Klan strewn in the streets, and a man was cited for littering after being found in possession of the leaflets leaving the town, according to WLWT 5.
Brewton Jr., who has been patrolling with the Safety and Watch Program as an unarmed member, said it was 'a bad thing for everybody' that Lincoln Heights residents had to keep watch over their own streets.
'I would for sure rather rely on the police,' Brewton Jr. said. '[This is] out of necessity.'