The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is arguing in court that the organization is a victim of a “vindictive prosecution” by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).
A federal grand jury in Montgomery dropped an 11-count indictment on the SPLC in April, accusing Alabama’s most notorious “anti-hate” nonprofit of quietly funneling more than $3 million in donor money to Klansmen, neo-Nazis, and white supremacist leaders, including the Imperial Wizard of the United Klans of America.
Tuesday, the SPLC pleaded not guilty in an arraignment in Montgomery for a superseding indictment, which does not contain any new charges or name new defendants from the original version.
“This apparent superseding indictment attempts to shore up the flaws in the initial charges, but it changes nothing,” the SPLC’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, said. “The SPLC did not lie to its donors, it did not mislead banks it did business with, and its informant program prevented violence and saved lives.”
The indictment against SPLC includes six counts of wire fraud, four of making false statements to a federally insured bank, and one count of conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering. It was announced in Washington by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel.
The SPLC filed a motion in federal court in May to dismiss the initial charges.
“This is the very definition of a vindictive prosecution,” lawyers for the SPLC wrote in May. “The Court should dismiss the indictment as a violation of due process.”
The indictment lands atop years of conservative pressure over the SPLC’s “hate map,” which has slotted mainstream Christian ministries and parental-rights groups alongside actual Klan chapters, and followed heightened scrutiny after the 2025 assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, whose Turning Point USA the SPLC had profiled as a case study in “the hard right.”
The case is set for trial in October.
Yaffee is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts “The Yaffee Program” weekdays 9-11 a.m. on WVNN. You can follow him on X @Yaffee
