SAN DIEGO — Amy Reichert, a conservative activist in San Diego, disclosed on May 21, 2025 that she had interviewed one of the teenagers later involved in the May 18, 2025 attack on the Islamic Center of San Diego. The attack left three people dead, and the two teenage suspects were found dead nearby with self-inflicted gunshot wounds, according to police.

Reichert had interviewed the teen and his mother for a June 2025 article published by the conservative website IW Features titled “This California Family is Fighting Back Against a Mandatory White Privilege Curriculum.” The article used pseudonyms for the suspect and his mother and described the teen as feeling singled out and targeted as a person of lesser value by his school’s ethnic studies course due to his mixed-race background.

IW Features deleted the article after the attack. Andrea Mew, managing editor of IW Features, said the article was removed because of “public criminal allegations” against the person profiled. The outlet continues to list Reichert as a contributor.

A day after the May 18 attack, Reichert shared excerpts of the suspects’ 75-page document on social media but did not initially disclose her prior interview with one of the suspects. She later told the Times of San Diego that it did not immediately occur to her that she had spoken to the suspect and that she had to review her text exchange with the suspect’s mother to confirm the connection.

Reichert said, “In no way am I suggesting that taking an ethnic studies class had anything whatsoever to do with this shooting.” The FBI stated that the two suspects were radicalized online, where they met and bonded over white supremacist propaganda. One of the suspects authored a 75-page document espousing hatred toward Islam, immigrants, Jewish people, Black people, women, and trans and gay people, and wrote that his “religion is the white race.”