The Department of Justice (DOJ) is alleging the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a well-known civil rights organization that purports to monitor right-wing hate groups, secretly funneled millions of dollars to white nationalists and extremists who worked for those same groups. The SPLC says the purpose of the payments was to compensate informants who were working to dismantle hate groups from the inside, but according to the feds, such a scheme amounts to fraud and money laundering.
Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the charges at a press conference on Tuesday, noting that a grand jury had already returned the indictment.
