The deadly shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego last month, which left three people dead, is not an isolated incident but the latest chapter in a long and documented history of white supremacist and neo-Nazi violence in San Diego County, according to community leaders and historians. The alleged shooters, an 18-year-old from Chula Vista and a 17-year-old from San Diego, left a 75-page manifesto expressing hatred for multiple groups, including Muslims, Jews, Latinos, Black people, immigrants, LGBTQ+ individuals, and women.
Law enforcement officials stated the suspects were radicalized online, a pattern that echoes past cases in the region.
San Diego's history with white supremacist ideology is deeply rooted, largely due to Tom Metzger, a former county resident and neo-Nazi leader who founded the White Aryan Resistance (WAR) in 1983. Metzger, who died in 2020, began his extremist career in the 1970s by joining the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan under David Duke, eventually becoming the Grand Dragon of California.
After a falling out with Duke, he established WAR and operated from Fallbrook, engaging in criminal activities for decades. Although his direct influence waned, the ideologies he promoted persisted and became more mainstream, according to Ricardo Favela, an educator who organized against Metzger in the 1990s.
Favela noted that the rhetoric he fought against then is now routine messaging from the Trump administration and other conservative politicians, normalizing and institutionalizing hate.
Racially motivated attacks are not new to San Diego. The 1984 San Ysidro McDonald's Massacre, where James Huberty killed 21 people and wounded 19 others, was initially attributed to mental illness.
However, Huberty had expressed hatred for Mexicans, blaming them for his job loss. Roberto D.
Hernández, a professor at San Diego State University, linked the attack to a long history of racial and colonial violence in the region, emphasizing that such violence is a symptom of a sector of white society struggling to maintain its perceived racial order.
Metzger advocated for lone wolf attacks after being found civilly liable for the 1988 murder of Ethiopian immigrant Mulugeta Seraw by WAR members in Portland, Oregon. He published a tactical guide, 'Laws of the Lone Wolf,' urging extremists to operate alone or in small cells to protect the movement.
Another figure, Alex Curtis, a Metzger associate, used the internet and his newsletter to radicalize others in the 1990s, leading to his arrest in 2000 following 'Operation Lone Wolf.'
Community leaders like Khalid Alexander, founder of Pillars of the Community, who knew all three victims, view the attack as a continuation of American history, comparing it to church bombings in Alabama. They criticize the federal government's counterterrorism strategies for not treating white supremacists as an urgent threat, noting that President Trump's 2026 terrorism strategy focuses on narcoterrorists and left-wing extremists but omits white supremacists.
Alexander stated that the shooting represents an inflection point, forcing people to choose sides in the struggle against oppression.