Leaders Call for Congressional Inquiry into SPLC Fraud Allegations

Leaders are calling for congressional inquiries following accusations of fraud by the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).

The SPLC has spent decades opposing white supremacy while also branding Christian organizations like Family Research Council and Focus on the Family as “hate groups” on par with Neo-Nazis and the KKK.

The organization has also urged financial institutions to de-bank conservatives.

But last month an indictment from a federal Grand Jury said the SPLC has secretly funneled more than $3 million to a covert network of informants affiliated with groups like the Ku Klux Klan.

According to the indictment, the SPLC laundered donations through fictitious companies to people in the very groups the SPLC claimed it was working to dismantle. In some cases, the SPLC allegedly gave money to individuals listed on its “extremist” website.

On May 20, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins testified before the House Judiciary Committee in a hearing titled ‘The Southern Poverty Law Center: Manufacturing Hate.’ The hearing examined the role SPLC has played in “distorting civil rights policy in recent years” — and the real-world consequences that followed.

Perkins testified that in August of 2012, a gunman entered FRC’s Washington, D.C., headquarters carrying a pistol and fifty rounds of ammunition. The attack was thwarted by a building manager who was seriously in the process.

The gunman later confessed to investigators that he selected FRC because of the SPLC’s website listing Family Research Council as a “hate group.” The attack cost FRC more than $6 million in security-related expenses.

Perkins also testified that around 2016, the SPLC began pressuring financial companies and tech platforms to deplatform and defund organizations it had labeled extremist.

Arkansas families and churches should pay close attention to this hearing. The SPLC’s “hate group” list isn’t trustworthy. Congress and federal officials are finally saying so out loud. Arkansans should encourage their representatives to support a full and thorough investigation — one that follows every spoke on that wheel.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.