Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey said her department is working to identify the neo-Nazi demonstrators who descended on Lincoln Heights earlier this month. She’s also reviewing how law enforcement handled the incident as widespread fury continues over the way officers interacted with the neo-Nazis. As McGuffey calls for Ohio lawmakers to criminalize behavior seen on the Vision Way overpass, one local representative tells CityBeat that Republicans won’t make it easy.
It all started on Feb. 7 when about a dozen neo-Nazis carried out a public demonstration on an I-75 overpass near Lincoln Heights. Photos and videos from residents and law enforcement showed the neo-Nazis waving large swastika-emblazoned flags.
Some of these flags were also tied to the overpass fence facing highway drivers. Photos shared online also showed a banner that said “America is for the White Man.” It took mere minutes for residents of the historically Black Lincoln Heights village to rush to the overpass and drive out the neo-Nazis. Reshares of an Instagram Live video from the clash appeared widely on TikTok, with one showing residents burning a swastika flag left on the overpass.
During a Feb. 18 press conference, McGuffey said her office has “a great deal” of information to identify the neo-Nazis, who she believes are from outside the region.
“We’re working on intelligence, getting information from other agencies, getting information from other people who are watching these groups, and we are working right now to identify all of these men,” she said.
McGuffey said her office has been in contact with the FBI, the Ohio Bureau of Investigation and Hamilton County Prosecutor Connie Pillich. She asked Pillich to research and investigate the available video footage and reports to help identify the neo-Nazi demonstrators, as well as legal frameworks that “may apply.”
“Connie Pillich’s office has agreed to research and investigate legal and constitutional issues that may apply here, and our internal affairs unit will also be conducting an administrative review,” McGuffey said.
Investigating the police response
McGuffey said her department is also planning to have sit-down talks with police leadership from Evendale and Lockland to better plan for possible neo-Nazi demonstrations in the future; media outlets and advocacy organizations have chronicled an uptick in neo-Nazi demonstrations in recent years.
“Those meetings will not be coordinated until the prosecutor’s office gives us, first, our own factual understanding of where we were, what we did, the codes, etc.,” she said. “Then we can sit down and meet.”
On Feb. 12, the Lockland Schools Board of Education released a statement demanding answers from the Evendale and Lockland police departments, saying security footage from the Lockland Educational Annex shows the neo-Nazis speaking to an Evendale officer on school property after the demonstration.
“Upon arrival, the men in the U-Haul are seen outside of the vehicle getting themselves and weapons organized. They can also be observed engaging in conversation with the Evendale officer,” the board said. “The Evendale Police Department officer left the scene prior to the U-Haul leaving. Prior to leaving, the truck and occupants are clearly seen ON school property, and our elementary school students were dismissed within minutes of all of this occurring. Most importantly to note, the school district was not notified of this potentially dangerous situation occurring on our school grounds.”
The Village of Evendale responded to the board’s message on the city’s website, saying, “Officers were trying to separate the groups as far apart as possible and lead them to a less visible area to further conduct their investigation. We recognize and agree with the school board’s outrage. This is part of the actions we will be reviewing from that day.”
On Feb. 18, the Evendale Emergency Service Facebook page announced that all 16 hours of body camera video would be publicly available for the community to review, linking to the videos on YouTube and Vimeo.
“Relevant to recent misinformation, we encourage you to review Body Cam 1 from VIMEO MINUTE 13:15 TO VIMEO MINUTE 26:30,” the city said in a follow-up post.
The body camera footage of the officer speaking to the neo-Nazis in the school’s alleyway occurs between 23:45 and 25:45.
“We’re trying to figure out a plan to get that Jeep,” the officer said to the unmasked driver of the U-Haul full of neo-Nazis.
One of the neo-Nazis had left their Jeep at a parking lot next to the overpass, unable to retrieve it without walking through the counter-protesters. A dog was also left in the Jeep during the rally. Weather data shows it was about 43 degrees in the Cincinnati area when the neo-Nazi demonstrator confessed this to the officer.
“If the dog in there is cool with me driving him to you guys, I can go get it,” the officer said to the neo-Nazi group in the U-Haul.
“He’s my service animal, that’s why I really need to get him,” said one unmasked neo-Nazi.
“Get your mask on, let’s go,” one neo-Nazi demonstrator can be heard saying to the neo-Nazi Jeep owner.
“I don’t give a fuck about my face right now, dude,” he replied.
“Just take, um,” the officer sighs. “Gosh, just take that black sweatshirt off and you can get in my car…”
“Cool, thank you, brother. God bless you, dude,” the neo-Nazi Jeep owner replies.
From there the officer talks to the men about logistics for getting the Jeep and confirms that they’re done for the day. The maskless neo-Nazi then gets in the Evendale officer’s car while the officer helps to buckle him in.
The officer is seen leaving the alleyway before the U-Haul departs. The neo-Nazi Jeep owner told the officer they were heading for Louisville, Kentucky.
The neo-Nazi is heard trying to make small talk from the back of the officer’s cruiser; the officer replied politely to some statements or not at all. At one point, the neo-Nazi demonstrator says something about the local area, the beginning of his sentence is difficult to hear, but the audio clears up mid-sentence:
“…the one with the soul food and the chicken wing spot,” he said.
“Yeah,” the officer replied.
“Like, where the Section 8’s are,” the neo-Nazi demonstrator said. “And I said, nu-uh, I said I’m not going…”
“Yeah,” the officer replied.
Statewide solutions
While speaking to reporters, McGuffey asked state lawmakers to give police more arresting power over armed demonstrators, with certain criteria.
“Just because this is protected speech, this hate speech does not mean that it’s okay, and I am calling on the legislature in Ohio to make it a crime to wear a mask for the purpose of intimidation while open-carrying a weapon,” McGuffey said. “I’m calling on the Ohio Legislature to give us options to put some laws in place so that we can take action on these individuals, so we can identify them, so we can prohibit them from wearing masks, so that we can confront this hate speech in an appropriate and concise way. That’s the legislature of Ohio’s responsibility, and those men and women up there in Ohio need to step up and get it done.”
Ohio’s House and Senate districts split right at the border of Lincoln Heights, the overpass where the Feb. 7 demonstration took place. CityBeat reached out to the Ohio Senate representatives from each district, Sen. Louis Blessing III and Sen. Steve Wilson, to ask if the Republican lawmakers would consider McGuffey’s call to action.
Wilson’s office told CityBeat he was unavailable for an interview, but said, “Senator Wilson strongly condemns the Nazi ideology that was expressed during the demonstration earlier this month.”
Blessing’s office did not immediately respond to CityBeat’s request for comment on McGuffey’s statements.
Ohio’s House districts near Lincoln Heights are similarly split, but held by two Democrats: Rep. Rachel Baker and Rep. Karen Brownlee. Baker and Brownlee did not immediately respond to CityBeat’s request for comment, but both representatives published a joint statement with other Hamilton County Democrats following the neo-Nazi rally.
“I am deeply disturbed by the presence of armed hatemongers in Lincoln Heights this weekend. This act of intimidation has no place in our communities. I am proud to represent and be a part of a community that does not support these ideals. My community supports a free, fair and just Ohio. I am thankful for the community’s willingness to work together to overcome this act of hate,” said Rep. Brownlee.
“Hate is not welcome in our community,” said Rep. Baker. “Lincoln Heights community members stood united and conveyed this message loud and clear – they showed the country how to peaceably run out hate. As those with hatred in their hearts become emboldened, we must strengthen our laws, increase our resources and protect our communities and children from having to confront this again.”
Rep. Dani Isaacsohn, a Democrat who represents a district south of Lincoln Heights, told CityBeat he’s not confident the current Republican-dominated statehouse is willing to write new gun laws.
“The levels of hate and vitriol and antisemitism and racism that are now out in the open and bubbling to the surface are beyond alarming,” Isaacsohn said. “We have to ask ourselves, is this going to help? I’m a strong believer in the First Amendment and a strong believer that we should have common sense gun laws. […] The issue is not whether people actually want that type of common-sense gun law. The issue is that the Republican majority in Ohio has been totally co-opted by the extreme wing of this issue, that they’re not even willing to entertain popular common sense gun laws like that.”
Related
When Can Police Arrest Nazis for Being Nazis?
In a previous story about the lack of neo–Nazi arrests during the incident in Lincoln Heights, CityBeat spoke with a legal scholar about why arresting Nazis for being Nazis is so difficult in the U.S. Ryan Thoreson is an assistant professor of constitutional law at the University of Cincinnati College of Law.
“I think, as a general matter, the Supreme Court has been very permissive toward hateful speech that is likely to offend and even to deeply offend the general public or particular communities,” Thoreson said. “A lot of the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence has been particularly wary of what it calls a hecklers veto, this idea that if an audience strongly disagrees with a message, that they should be able to override the speaker’s right to convey that message, and that applies even when the speech is particularly upsetting to the audience who hears it.”
McGuffey seems to think the neo-Nazis from Feb. 7 may have overstepped the guardrails of free speech, calling their actions a “threat.”
“This intimidation is a threat to our community and should never happen,” McGuffey said. “It may be legally protected speech, but I can tell you, it is not okay. Intimidating citizens is not okay.”
Follow CityBeat’s staff news writer Madeline Fening on Instagram. Got a news tip? Email mfening@citybeat.com.
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This article appears in Feb 19 – Mar 4, 2025.