Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
- The Southern Poverty Law Center faces a federal indictment alleging fraud.
- The charges include wire fraud and money laundering, with $3 million allegedly misused.
- The center denies allegations, citing informants' role in saving lives and protecting staff.
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration obtained a criminal indictment on Tuesday charging the Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights group that tracks political extremists, with defrauding its own donors by using paid informants to infiltrate organizations.
The 11-count indictment, returned by a federal grand jury in Alabama, levels charges of wire fraud, bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering against the center as an organization. No individuals or other entities were named as defendants.
The 55-year-old law center, which had long shared information it collected with the FBI and other law enforcement groups before the Trump administration cut ties with it six months ago, decried the charges as "false allegations."
"Taking on violent hate and extremist groups is among the most dangerous work there is, and we believe it is also among the most important work we do," the organization's interim CEO and President Bryan Fair said in a statement.
He said the center was reviewing the 14-page indictment, but added that its program of paid informants has "saved lives."
Announcing the indictment at a news conference, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche accused the center of "manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred."
The criminal charges stem from fraud the indictment said the nonprofit law center committed by covertly funneling more than $3 million from donations to the members of hate groups, including the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi organizations, between 2014 and 2023.
According to the indictment, the payments amounted to fraud because the center opened bank accounts connected to fake entities to disguise the source of the payments and deceived donors by soliciting contributions under false pretenses.
In a video statement released hours before the charges were announced, Fair defended the use of paid informants to collect information, a practice the FBI says it uses in its own investigations, as necessary to protect Southern Poverty Law Center staff from potential violence.
Fair said his organization had refrained from widely publicizing such methods in order to protect the informants themselves and their families.
Aiming justice system at adversaries
Tuesday's indictment marks the latest bid by the Justice Department under President Donald Trump to use the criminal justice system against his perceived adversaries.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, formed in the early 1970s to defend the legal rights of Black Americans following the civil rights reforms of the 1960s, has frequently accused Trump officials of trafficking in conspiracy theories and racism.
Trump administration officials and conservative figures have in the past criticized the Alabama-based center for labeling some far-right entities as hate groups.
FBI Director Kash Patel in October ended a yearslong working relationship between his agency and the center, calling the group a "partisan smear machine" that had been used to defame people and inspire violence.
Patel's action came weeks after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, whose conservative youth organization, Turning Point USA, was included in the center's "Hate Map" and described as an anti-government group.
The Trump administration has launched a multipronged effort to investigate the activities and funding streams of liberal organizations it accuses of promoting violence or espousing views it defines as domestic terrorism.
Targets of what Trump's critics see as a broad crackdown on free speech have included supporters of pro-Palestinian protests and liberal nonprofits opposed to his agenda, including his immigration and climate policies.
In his recorded statement early on Tuesday, Fair said his organization was aware that it was facing a criminal investigation and possible charges over the use of paid informants.
"Today, the federal government has been weaponized to dismantle the rights of our nation's most vulnerable people and any organization like ours that stands in the breach," Fair said in the video. "We will not be intimidated into silence or contrition, and we will not abandon our mission or the communities we serve."
Contributing: Steve Gorman
