DOJ Charges Southern Poverty Law Center with Funding Extremist Groups

The Justice Department filed a federal indictment Tuesday against the civil rights organization Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) for allegedly engaging in activities that authorities say contradict its stated mission to combat extremism. The 11-count indictment handed down by a federal grand jury includes six counts of wire fraud, four counts of false statements to a federally insured banking institution and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering.

Bothacting Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel noted that the Alabama-based organization is accused of funneling significant financial resources to extremist groups, including the Ku Klux Klan and the National Socialist Party of America. "SPLC paid members of these extremist groups. To that end, it was doing the exact opposite of what it told its donors it was doing, not dismantling extremism but funding it," Blanche said at a press conference, where he also noted that the DOJ investigation found that the organization had been "manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred," and then concealing those payments.

SPLC's response to DOJ's allegations

The case against the organization comes amid tensions between it and the administration of President Donald Trump, to the point that Patel had previously cut ties with the group after years of working with law enforcement on hate crimes and domestic extremism investigations. Subsequent to Blanche's remarks, the FBI director indicated to reporters that the indictment against the SPLC could be the first in a series of similar actions targeting other organizations.

In response to the indictment, SPLC executive director Bryan Fair released a statement publicly rejecting it. "We will not be intimidated into silence or contrition and we will not abandon our mission or the communities we serve. This moment in history finds Americans in a critical struggle between those who continue to pull and bend the arc of history toward justice and those who resist progress. We will vigorously defend ourselves, our staff, and our work," Fair said.

Also, the organization's executive director suggested that the investigation against him may be focused on the SPLC's use throughout its history of confidential informants, a practice he openly defended. "When we began working with informants, we were living in the shadow of the height of the Civil Rights Movement, which had seen bombings at churches, state-sponsored violence against demonstrators, and the murders of activists that went unanswered by the justice system. There is no question that what we learned from informants saved lives."