Yes, Orange County has always had a neo-Nazi problem. A new deeply reported book explains why

Have you heard of Orange County? This is where good Republicans go before they die.

It's no surprise that Orange County, the favorite county of the grandfather of modern American conservatism, Ronald Reagan, has become fertile ground for far-right ideology and white supremacy. Reaganomics aside, The OK has long occupied a special, if somewhat off-putting, place with a mix of oceanfront vacations, modern luxury and all-American family entertainment made famous by popular shows (The Real Housewives of Orange County, The OK and Laguna Beach, among others). Even crime in Orange County became sensationalized and glamorous, with themes cloaked in wealth, secrecy, and illusions of suburban perfection. Eric Lichtblau, Pulitzer Prize Winner and former Los Angeles Times reporter, the real story is far-right terrorism—and its silent influence on the county's history.

“One of the reasons I decided to focus on Orange County is because it's not the norm, it's not what you call the Deep South. It's Disneyland. It's California“,” says Lichtblau. “These are people who are trying to take back America off the coast of Orange County because they think it's become too brown.”

His newest investigative book “American Reich” focuses on the 2018 murder of gay Jewish teenager Blaze Bernstein as a lens through which to study Orange County and how a hate-motivated murder at the hands of a former classmate is connected to a national network of white supremacy and terrorism.

I grew up a few miles from Bernstein, attending a performing arts school similar to his and Sam Woodward's. I remember the early discovery of the murder in which Woodward became a suspect, and then the news that the case was being investigated as a hate crime. The murder followed the news cycle for years to come, but its coverage lacked consistency in understanding how the event fit into the larger picture and history ingrained in Orange County. There was a bar across the street from me where an Iranian-American was stabbed to death simply because he wasn't white. Marblehead Seaside Park, where my friends and I went to take homecoming sunset photos, was reported as the site of morning meetings of neo-Nazis wearing skeleton masks, training to fight “white unity.” These are just a few of the many events that Lichtblau examines as symptoms of something more troubling than isolated incidents.

Lichtblau began writing the book in 2020, during the height of COVID. He wanted to find a place that symbolized the national epidemic he, like many others, had witnessed – one of the highest rates of anti-Asian attacks, attacks on Black, Latinx and LGBTQ+ communities, and a rise in extremist rhetoric and actions.

“Orange County fits into a lot of those boxes,” Lichtblau says. “The terrible tragedy that Blaise Bernstein was murdered by one of his classmates who was radicalized reflected the growing brazenness of the white supremacist movement that we have seen generally in America in recent years.”

Bernstein's death had occurred just two years earlier. The Ivy League student agreed to meet former classmate Woodward one evening during winter break. The two were never close; Woodward was a lone wolf during his short tenure at the Orange County School of the Arts before being transferred due to the school's liberal nature. Twice over the years, Woodward approached Bernstein under the pretext of struggling with his sexuality. Bernstein had no idea he was being bullied, or that his former classmate was part of a sprawling underground network of far-right extremists linked to mass shootings, longtime followers of Charles Manson, neo-Nazi camps and online networks whose members were united by a shared fantasy of harming minorities and starting a white revolution.

“But how will this happen in 2025?”

These networks did not appear out of nowhere. They have been planted in the soil of Orange County for a long time, dating back to the early 1900s when the county had extensive orange groves.

Mexican workers who formed the basis of the orange grove economy (second only to oil and manufacturing) wealth that even rivaled the gold rush), were met with violence when union workers wanted to strike for better working conditions. The Orange County Sheriff, also an orange farmer, issued the order. “SHOOT FOR KILL, SHERIFF SAYS,” read a banner headline in the Santa Ana Register. Chinese immigrants also faced violence. They played a major role in building the county government, but they were accused of having leprosy, and at the suggestion of a councilman, their Chinatown community was set on fire in front of white residents.

As the new millennium approached, an onslaught of white power rock arrived on the county's music scene. Community members with shaved heads and Nazi memorabilia danced to rage-fueled statements of white supremacy, clashing, if not worse, with non-white community members, hearing lyrics like, “When the last white man leaves the OK, the American flag will go with me… We will die for the land that is yours and mine” (from Youngland).

Veteran and member of one of the Orange County white supremacist factions, Wade Michael Page. later killed six worshipers at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin in 2012.

“It came and went,” says Lichtblau, who noticed a change in those tides in the early 2000s—and in subsequent years—as Reigandland broke in parts and turned purple. Even with the blue on the red, Trump on the landscape created a new wave that, as Lichtblau explains, was about “taking back your country” and “capturing the moment Trump let go.”

It can be difficult to grasp the reality that white supremacist Orange County exists alongside an Orange County economically and culturally shaped by immigrant communities where, since 2004, majority its inhabitants are people of color. Again, anyone who has spent significant time there will notice a strange cognitive dissonance among its cultural landscape.

It's an unusual sight to see a MAGA stand selling nativist slogans on a street with a Spanish name, or Confederate flags on the backs of pickup trucks pulling into the parking lots of neighborhood diners or Vietnamese photoshops for a bite to eat. Or some of the families who have lived in the area for generations, still employing Latino workers, but in their living rooms Fox News will play out alarmist rhetoric about “Hispanics,” along with Reagan-era memorabilia proudly displayed next to framed Bible verses. This divided reality—a multicultural community and one on the far right—strangely populates the fabric of a county born out of a split with its neighbor, Los Angeles, only to develop an aggressive identity against that neighbor's perceived liberality.

It is this cultural rejection that has given rise to the “Orange Curtain” or “Orange County Bubble,” which suggests that these racially charged ideologies remain controlled or, tediously, reflected in the county sphere. In contrast, Lichtblau saw these types of white suburbs spill over. Look no further than Insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6. also the book's release date.

Although popular belief might suggest that these rebels came from deeply conservative areas, in fact they were contrary toas Lichtblau explains. “It was from places like Orange County,” he says, “where voting patterns have seen the most changes.” Some might argue—strongly or reluctantly—that January 6 was just a failed anti-theft protest, a momentary oversight, or mob mentality. But Lichtblau sees something much bigger. “It was a show of white pride. There was a lot of neo-Nazi stuff, including a lot of Orange County stuff.”

Society has collectively decided to expect the image of a lone killer, an outcast with an identity based on the illusions of white oppression – the type who opposes the dole but still cashes a check. Someone like Sam Woodward, carved out of the remnants of a once venerable conservative Americana family, the type of God-fearing Christians who, while the “American Reich” is studying in the Woodward household, are taught and bound by ideological hatred, and even while in a murder case, constantly turn on the victim's family to the point that the judge has to intervene. The existence of these suburban families is known, as is the slippery hope that they will never be crossed in this constantly spinning game of American roulette. But neither these people nor their hate crimes are random, as Lichtblau claims, and lone wolves are not as lonely as assumed. These underground channels have long been ingrained in the American landscape like landmines, and are now being activated by a far-right digital landscape that unites these members and multiplies their ideologies on a national level. Lichtblau's new investigation goes beyond the Orange County paradigm and reveals a deeper cultural epidemic that is taking shape.

Beavin Pappas is an arts and culture writer. Raised in Orange County, he now divides his time between New York and Cairo, where he is working on his debut book.