Tag: splc

Southern Poverty Law Center indicted on federal fraud charges related to past use of paid informants

The Southern Poverty Law Center has been indicted on federal fraud charges related to its past use of paid informants to infiltrate extremist groups, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said Tuesday.

The civil rights group faces charges including wire fraud, bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering in the case brought by the Justice Department in Alabama, where the organization is based.

The indictment came shortly after SPLC revealed the existence of a criminal investigation into its program to pay informants to infiltrate extremist groups and gather information on their activities. The group said the program was used to monitor threats of violence and the information was often shared with local and federal law enforcement.

SPLC CEO Bryan Fair said the organization “will vigorously defend ourselves, our staff, and our work.”

Blanche said the SPLC paid at least $3 million between 2014 and 2023 to people affiliated with the Ku Klux Klan, the United Klans of America, the National Socialist Party of America and other extremist groups.

“The SPLC was not dismantling these groups. It was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred,” Blanche said.

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New Complaint Calls for Investigation Into Southern Poverty Law Center’s Tax Exempt Status

Calls to investigate the tax-exempt status of the far-left extremists at the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) are increasing with a new complaint filed with federal authorities. The complaint calls for a full review of the organization’s status as a “charitable” organization.  The charitable designation offers significant tax benefits to the organization.

The Federalist reports that the Center to Advance Security in America (CASA) submitted a complaint to Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Acting Commissioner Scott Bessent, requesting a full review in light of the SPLC’s “hyper-partisan political activity.”

CASA Director James Fitzpatrick told The Federalist, “American taxpayers should not be expected to subsidize an organization that engages in daily attacks on Republicans, compares those who hold mainstream conservative beliefs to the KKK, and who consistently labels conservatives as engaging in ‘hate’ without any reference to any other political parties or ideologies.”

“We believe the American people are entitled to a full investigation into this urgent matter.”

Per The Federalist:

Addressed to Treasury Secretary and Acting IRS Commissioner Scott Bessent, the legal complaint obtained by The Federalist requests that the federal agency launch an investigation into the SPLC over “several serious concerns about [its] compliance with federal law regarding tax-exempt status under Section 501(c)(3) including but not limited to it no longer fulfilling a charitable purpose and its partisan political activity.”

As described by the nonprofit watchdog InfluenceWatch, the SPLC is a “controversial left-of-center advocacy group that claims to be a watchdog of extremist groups.” The organization “has been criticized for its financial practices and for characterizing non-violent conventional conservative organizations as equivalent to violent extremists.”

As further noted by Fitzpatrick in CASA’s complaint to the IRS, the SPLC “liken[s] normal, mainstream, conservative beliefs, to that of the KKK” and labels “political candidates and government officials, only Republicans, on their hate lists or hate watch articles.” The leftist group notably characterized Turning Point USA — the organization founded by the recently assassinated Charlie Kirk — as a “hard right” group that embraces “white nationalist” conspiracies.

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Fitzpatrick went on to note that the SPLC’s status as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt “charitable” organization allows it to “raise money or financing while avoiding state and federal income taxes, unemployment taxes, and in some cases property or other state taxes.” This also means that donors’ financial contributions to the group can be tax deductible.

A few months before Charlie Kirk’s political assassination, SPLC’s “Year in Hate and Extremism” report, named Turning Point USA (TPUSA) a “hate group.”

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