By Megan Sayles
AFRO Staff Writer
msayles@afro.com
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) on May 7 pleaded not guilty to all 11 counts of wire fraud, false statements to a federally insured bank and conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering in an indictment returned by an Alabama federal grand jury last month.
Credit: Photo courtesy of University of Alabama School of Law
The April 21 indictment accused the nonprofit of secretly directing donor funds to paid informants affiliated with extremist groups—including the Ku Klux Klan and Aryan Nations— while allegedly concealing the payments through fake entities and disguised financial transactions.
“The charges against the SPLC are provably wrong; they are based on inaccurate facts and a misapplication of law. Our informant program was successful in accomplishing its purposes: threats and attacks were prevented, criminal activity was stopped and information was gathered to dismantle the efforts of hate and extremist groups,” said Bryan Fair, interim president and CEO for SPLC, in a May 7 statement. “There is no question that the information the SPLC shared with law enforcement saved lives.”
In April, the SPLC filed two motions, arguing that senior Department of Justice (DOJ) officials made public statements—including claims on television and in press appearances that the organization did not share information from its informant program with law enforcement— which it says are false and misleading. The organization contends those statements, along with broader public commentary about the case, risk jeopardizing its right to a fair trial and raise concerns that similar false statements may have been presented to the federal grand jury.
The SPLC requested that the court order the federal government to retract Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s comments and prohibit further public statements it describes as false or prejudicial. It also asked for disclosure of the grand jury transcript.
In a court filing opposing the request, prosecutors argued that the SPLC’s claims are based on speculation rather than evidence. The government also said the nonprofit has not met the legal standard required to obtain grand jury materials and that its allegations of misconduct were unsupported.
“Moreover, the public comments in question—whether the SPLC ever shared information obtained by its field sources with law enforcement—are simply not relevant to the charges in the indictment,” wrote Acting U.S. Attorney Kevin P. Davidson. “This case is about fraudulently obtaining money from donors, lying to banks and concealing payments to the same organizations SPLC publicly told donors they were fighting against.”
Over the course of its history, SPLC has extensively tracked and published reports on hate groups, antigovernment militias and White nationalist movements. Many of the organizations it has tracked have been linked to conservative or far-right movements, which has long made the SPLC a target of criticism from conservatives.
That history has led some to question whether the case is politically motivated. Janai Nelson, president and director-counsel for the Legal Defense Fund (LDF), denounced the indictment in a statement.
Credit: Photo courtesy of Legal Defense Fund
“LDF condemns in the strongest possible terms any effort to deploy government resources to target civil rights organizations committed to exposing White supremacy instead of trying to combat it,” said Nelson. “The federal government is duty bound to protect the rights and liberties of all people in the United States and not act as an instrument of intimidation. We stand in solidarity with the SPLC and reject this apparent attempt to distract from this failure and other failures of this administration.”
The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law also released a statement saying the indictment was a part of a broader effort to intimidate civil rights organizations.
“It threatens to undermine advocacy groups confronting white supremacy that harms Black communities and other historically targeted groups. SPLC is a leading authority on organized hate groups and undertakes the complex and often dangerous work of investigating and exposing these networks,” said the committee in a statement. “Its outstanding record of tracking and addressing hate belies the misguided premise of the indictment—that somehow supporting the very hate groups it has long helped to discredit and dismantle.”
The group reaffirmed its solidarity with SPLC.
“The American people know what is really happening here,” said the Lawyers’ Committee. “DOJ is attempting to turn civil rights protections on their head to intimidate organizations like the SPLC from making meaningful progress toward achieving true racial justice in this country.”
