The Southern Poverty Law Center has told a federal court that law enforcement agencies were not kept in the dark about the nonprofit’s paid informant program, as it mounts an early defense to fraud and money-laundering charges. The SPLC said it used confidential informants to gather information about hate-group activity and that it provided that information to authorities in multiple instances, contradicting assertions by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.
In filings made as part of its first legal defense, the Alabama-based nonprofit asked the court to order Blanche to retract statements the government had “no information” about the informant program and to prevent him from making further similar remarks. SPLC also argued that Blanche’s public comments could affect jurors and compromise its right to a fair trial, according to the filings described in the court submissions.
The SPLC’s court filing includes a quoted assertion that “The Department of Justice is well aware that the SPLC provided helpful information, through the use of its confidential informants, to law enforcement,” and that “these confidential informants helped law enforcement put violent extremists in jail.” The nonprofit said it requested a retraction after Blanche made the comment in a press conference last week and later on Fox News when charges were announced, and that the government declined, according to the group.
SPLC’s attorneys said the filings detail three instances in which the center said information from its informant program was shared with law enforcement. The filing also says SPLC presented information from at least one of those cases during an April meeting with prosecutors and attorneys, in the nonprofit’s effort to document how authorities were informed.
One example SPLC cited involved an “event alert” that prosecutors alleged was part of the nonprofit’s broader conduct. The SPLC said it sent a 45-page “event alert” to the FBI in advance of the 2017 white nationalist “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and that the alert included information gathered from its informant program, including information about some attendees’ weapons.
SPLC also said its informant program helped thwart a planned attack in Las Vegas in a 2019 case. The nonprofit said it shared information with law enforcement that led to an FBI arrest of a man associated with Atomwaffen Division, a white supremacist group, and the filing notes that a 2020 Justice Department news release said the man discussed attacking a synagogue and a bar catering to LGBTQ customers. That man was sentenced to two years in prison, according to the SPLC-described account.
In another case, SPLC said intelligence from its informant program was passed to law enforcement and helped lead to the conviction of a man who lied about his ties to a white supremacist group while requesting national security clearance. SPLC said that man worked at Philadelphia’s Navy Yard in 2018 and was convicted and sentenced to prison following the tip, with details described in the filing. The SPLC said attorneys presented evidence to prosecutors at an April 6 meeting showing how information from the informant program was shared in that case.
Alongside seeking Blanche’s retraction, SPLC also filed a motion seeking grand jury transcripts, arguing false statements may have been used to secure the indictment. The nonprofit said mischaracterizations by the Justice Department “suggest that the grand jury was not merely misled by the government’s presentation of the law, but likely that it was actively weaponized to facilitate such charges,” in the language attributed to the motion.
Prosecutors, meanwhile, accuse SPLC of secretly promoting racist groups while publicly saying it fought them, and they said the nonprofit used donated money to pay informants who were leaders in the KKK, the neo-Nazi National Alliance and other hate groups. The indictment said SPLC funneled more than $3 million in donated money to informants and charged it with fraud and money laundering tied to allegations that the group misled donors by using their funds for the informant network.
The case has also drawn political attention. The filing and described reporting said President Donald Trump has seized on it, calling SPLC one of the “greatest political scams in American History” and linking it to claims about the 2020 election. Critics have described the prosecution as politically motivated, saying the Justice Department is being used to punish opponents of conservatives.
On Tuesday, Bryan Fair, the interim president and CEO of SPLC, said information shared with the FBI “has saved lives.” In a statement, Fair said that “When threats and other unlawful activity were revealed, the SPLC immediately passed that information to law enforcement officials, local, state and federal and assisted in efforts to prevent violence and stop criminal activity,” echoing the center’s position that law enforcement received the informant information it now says was never hidden.