Recently it was announced that the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is under indictment for giving more than $3 million to individuals affiliated with extremist groups that the SPLC is ideologically opposed to.
Before I get into this recent news, I want to discuss the history of the SPLC.
The SPLC was established in 1971 by lawyers Morris Dees and Joseph Levin Jr., with Dees being the main leader within the organization. Dedicated to “fighting hate and bigotry”, the SPLC began to monitor the activities of various hate groups and other organizations it deemed to be extremist. In 1981, it came with the idea of Klanwatch in order to target the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) by means of litigation education, and monitoring. Thus, the SPLC would keep tabs on the KKK and eventually brought lawsuits against the Klan.
One of the best-known lawsuits the SPLC pursued was a 1987 lawsuit against the United Klans of America (UKA). The lawsuit originated after a couple of its members viciously murdered an African-American named Michael Donald.
Despite both members being convicted (in which one of them was sent to the electric chair) and the fact the UKA was fledgling, Morris Dees felt that the wheels of justice had not gone far enough. So, he persuaded Michael’s mother Beulah Mae Donald to file a lawsuit against the UKA. The result of the civil trial resulted in a $7 judgment against the UKA, which was only able to come up with around $50,000 (and supposedly handed over the deed to its headquarters as well).
In addition to this lawsuit, the SPLC claimed it has successfully other hate groups, including the White Patriot Party militia, the White Aryan Resistance, and the Aryan Nations.
In addition to targeting hate groups, the SPLC began compiling a list of any group it considered to be extremist, even exaggerating the number of such groups. Many conservative groups soon fell into this category, including the David Horowitz Freedom Center, American Family Association, and Act for America.
Meanwhile, the SPLC’s assets exceed $732 million, the result of lawsuits and donations (the latter continuing despite Dees’s promise to halt fundraising when the SPLC had $55 million in assets).
So why has the SPLC given money to groups it considers to be extremist? Is it looking for more opportunities at lawsuits? Unlikely considering its massive wealth. Is it running out of groups to target? Unlikely considering it keeps adding to its list. Or maybe it’s because of the group’s anti-American views (i.e. the SPLC sees America as a prejudiced nation).
But now that the SPLC’s fraudulent and hypocritical activities have been exposed, its days could be numbered.
Source: Clash Daily
