The Southern Poverty Law Center
(SPLC) is being outed as the evil corrupt Leftist organization. The Mainstream
Media (MSM) has been using the SPLC as a credible source for information and
data for quite some time. Sixty-Seven Conservative leaders have written an open
letter to the MSM for sourcing with the SPLC.
WASHINGTON, April 3, 2019 /Christian Newswire/ -- Family Research Council (FRC)
today joined a coalition of 67 conservative leaders and organizations in
releasing an open letter to news organizations, calling on the media to stop
using data from the discredited Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) which has
been exposed from within as having a culture of long-standing, long-ignored
racial discrimination and sexual harassment. The unraveling scandal has so far
claimed the organization's founder, its president, and a top attorney.
The letter reads in part:
"In September 2017, a group
similar to the one signing below wrote a public letter to warn the news media
about the untrustworthy and corrupt nature of the Southern Poverty Law Center
(SPLC). We suggested then that you refrain from using the SPLC as a source.
Some news organizations and individuals became more circumspect about the SPLC,
but, unfortunately, some did not. That said, 2017 and 2018 produced several
publications marking the beginning of a much-needed reassessment of the SPLC's
self-appointed standing as America's arbiter of 'hate.'
"The SPLC's ability to deflect and parry seems to have ended with its
March 13 firing of Morris Dees, its co-founder and leader for almost five
decades. Dees' termination was accompanied by a terse, opaque
pronouncement...Dees' firing was not the only shoe to drop. Within ten days
both the president, Richard Cohen, and the legal director, Rhonda Brownstein,
had left the SPLC.
"In response to this inner upheaval, Morris Dees was fired unceremoniously.
Next, the management hired Michelle Obama's former chief of staff, attorney
Tina Tchen, to investigate its workplace culture. This choice raises serious
concerns about the neutrality of the investigation. And the choice appears
particularly problematic given Tchen recently making headlines for interfering
with the Chicago Police Department's Jussie Smollett investigation.
"If SPLC is interested in restoring its lost credibility with the public
and remaining SPLC staff, an SPLC-initiated investigation should include...a
responsible investigator to examine the various news reports over the years
that have pointed to deep flaws in the SPLC and publicly lay out who within the
Center knew what and when about these work conditions.
"It (SPLC) attacks anyone who disagrees with its far-left agenda, smearing
them with lies and grossly mischaracterizing their work. All the while SPLC has
also been imploding from within, with allegations of sex and race
discrimination - which have hounded them for years - finally boiling over with
the firing of Dees and the resignation of Cohen.
"SPLC has lost all credibility. We call on all media, corporations, social
media companies, and financial institutions to immediately stop relying on
their discredited and partisan 'hate' and 'extremist' lists."
Founded in 1983, Family
Research Council is a nonprofit research and educational organization dedicated
to articulating and advancing a family-centered philosophy of public life. In
addition to providing policy research and analysis for the legislative,
executive, and judicial branches of the federal government, FRC seeks to inform
the news media, the academic community, business leaders, and the general
public about family issues that affect the nation from a biblical worldview.
Our vision is a prevailing
culture in which all human life is valued, families flourish, and religious
liberty thrives.
The Leftist propaganda organization vainly trying to shore
up their reputation as a hate-watchdog – Southern Poverty Law Center
(SPLC) – constantly condemns non-violent Christian organizations, Conservative
values organizations and Counterjihad people/organizations as hate-groups. BUT
the SPLC says violence oriented ANTIFA is not a hate-group.
But there’s something you simply don’t understand about
antifa, according to the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center, which has
appointed itself America’s leading arbiter of “hate”:
The brutally violent “domestic terrorists” don’t actually
espouse hate.
“If you are familiar with our work, we write about antifa
often,” SPLC President Richard Cohen told the House Homeland Security Committee
on Nov. 30. “We condemn their tactics – I’ve said so publicly and we do so
always – but antifa is not a group that vilifies people on the basis of
race, ethnicity, religion and the like.”
Except antifa certainly does vilify people, especially based
on political viewpoint, and sometimes even based on religion.
On the day of President Trump’s inauguration, antifa members rioted in Washington, D.C.,
smashing a limousine window with a hammer, shattering storefronts, vandalizing
bus stops and throwing rocks at police officers, six of whom sustained
injuries.
After the inauguration, antifa rioters smashed windows and
set fires in Portland.
In February, antifa activists set the University of
California at Berkeley campus on fire, throwing rocks through windows and
causing $100,000 in damages. In March, they shouted down a Gold Star mother
whose child was killed in the line of duty. Then they crashed a pro-Trump march
in Berkeley while reportedly toting bricks and baseball bats.
The “alt-left” has been around for decades, but
conservatives have remained ignorant. Now, WND takes you inside antifa with an
exclusive special report revealing the origins, motivations and future of
America’s most widespread and active domestic terrorist group. Get your FREE
copy of “Antifa: What Americans
Need to Know about the Alt-Left.”
In April, they crashed a Trump rally again, this time
carrying knives, flagpoles and sticks. In May, they made an appearance at a May
Day rally in Portland, assaulting cops, lighting fires and spray-painting a
police car. In June, antifa activists wore masks and protested in Portland at a
rally for President Trump. Police were forced to deploy stingballs and grenades
with rubber pellets to keep the antifa activists away so Trump supporters could
finish their speeches.
Antifa threw bricks, rocks, marbles, tampons, urine and
feces, PBS reported. They left
graffiti messages stating, “STAB A NAZI, TWICE :).”
In August 4,000 Antifa agitators and other leftists
shut down a “No to Marxism” rally and prayer vigil being held by about 400
conservative Christians in Berkeley, California. Police released mugshots of 11 of the
13 persons arrested at the violent political riots in the university town. Charges
include assault with a deadly weapon, felony assault and various municipal code
violations. One officer was injured while making an arrest, and several
others were struck with paint and bottles.
Antifa’s war cry, caught on video during the rally, was no
less than the total destruction of American society. “No Trump, no wall, no USA
at all!” they chanted.
But don’t confuse any of those actions with “hate,” says the
SPLC, which has condemned groups and public figures who disagree
with its agenda, putting them on its “hate” map, which once prominently
included former presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson before the group was
skewered on social media, prompting an abrupt retreat.
While featuring organizations such as the KKK, the
“hate map” – which is cited by many media outlets – also
includes mainstream groups such as the Family Research Council.
Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., questioned the SPLC’s refusal to
include antifa on its “hate map,” telling Cohen that it “reduces your
credibility.” Perry accused the leftist group of picking and choosing which
individuals and groups it includes on its map based not on actual facts but
“only your opinion.”
“So you’re OK with antifa as long as they don’t say things
that you don’t agree with, but it’s OK if they hit people on the head with a
bike lock or set things on fire or riot and flout the law by wearing face masks
and incite riots – you’re OK with that?” Perry asked.
Cohen responded: “We condemn groups like antifa. We write
about them often. We don’t list them as hate groups.”
He claimed the Family Research Council is included on the
“hate map” because it “relentlessly vilifies” members of the LGBT community.
“Our listing of hate groups doesn’t necessarily mean that
they engage in violence, although we think that the anti-LGBT propaganda is one
of the factors that makes the LGBT community in our country the most likely to
be victimized by hate crimes,” Cohen said.
Ironically, the SPLC’s own “hate map” appears to have
incited violence against the Family Research Council in 2012
when a gunman shot the group’s security guard after consulting the
“hate map.”
SPLC was linked to domestic terror through Floyd Lee
Corkins, who cited SPLC as his inspiration for his going to the Washington
offices of the Family Research Council, armed with a gun, intending to kill as
many people as he could. He was stopped by a security guard, who was
injured. WND reported a video showed Corkins entering the FRC
offices and confronting Leo Johnson.
On August 15. 2012 at 10:46 a.m., Floyd Corkins entered
the lobby of Family Research Council armed with a loaded semi-automatic pistol,
100 rounds of ammunition, and 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches. FRC building manager
Leo Johnson was temporarily manning the front desk at our Washington
headquarters when a now-confessed terrorist intent on killing everyone in the
building entered with a handgun and 100 rounds of ammunition. As he drew his
gun, Leo courageously charged the attacker into oncoming gunfire. Even after
sustaining a direct hit to his forearm, he subdued the attacker and wrestled
the gun away from him.
Why did confessed terrorist Corkins
choose Family Research Council as a target for his attack? In an FBI
interrogation, Corkins admitted he found his target from the Southern Poverty
Law Center's list.]
Cohen denied all responsibility for the 2012 shooting at
FRC.
He defended SPLC’s selections of groups and individuals
to include on its “hate map,” noting that includes groups like the Nation of
Islam and the New Black Panther Party.
Perry then noted that the organization Students for Justice
in Palestine has called for violence against Jews. He asked Cohen why the group
wasn’t included on its map.
“I don’t know about that particular group,” Cohen said. “We
try to call hate as we see it. We limit our list not by left versus right but
by groups that villify others for factors such as race, ethnicity, sexual
orientation, religion or the like.”
“What we try to get Google to do is not prioritize hate
groups,” he explained, citing racist shooter Dylann Roof, who searched “black
on white crime” before he killed nine black churchgoers in 2015 at a church in
Charleston, South Carolina.
Cohen continued, “So we’re trying to say to Google, your
algorithm is flawed or easily manipulated.”
In another line of questioning, Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La.,
asked why SPLC, a nonprofit, is stashing at least $69 million in its offshore
accounts.
“I think there’s been some confusion in the press about
this,” Cohen claimed. “It’s common for nonprofit organizations, including
universities and big foundations, to have money in offshore accounts. It avoids
two things: certain kinds of filings and unrelated business income tax.”
Cohen also told the House Homeland Security Committee that
Trump’s campaign for the White House “energized the white supremacist
movement.” He said the white-supremacist website Stormfront doubled its
visitors between 2008 and 2017.
But Rep. Thomas Garrett, R-Va., noted that the number of
Stormfront’s visitors increased most rapidly during the administration of
Barack Obama. And the biggest growth in black separatist groups on SPLC’s
“hatewatch” list took place while Obama was president.
“Again, this isn’t President Obama’s fault. It’s not, is
it?” Garrett asked. “I mean, I don’t think it is. If someone were to say that
the prevalence of these groups is because of the rhetoric of one individual,
that would be oversimplifying the problem, would it not?”
Cohen responded, “Depending on the individual.”
Garrett then observed that SPLC’s staff tends to contribute
to Democrats. And he also noted that SPLC works with leftist organizations like
Media Matters for America.
“I respect what you do. I’m concerned with how you’re doing
it,” Garrett said, adding: “[It] troubles those to see an entity that has
essentially been de facto made responsible for determing [sic] what is and
isn’t hate that skews almost exclusively as do their collaborators in a particular
direction.
But it shouldn’t be shocking to anyone that SPLC is staffed
by leftists, Cohen said.
“The liberal tradition is an inclusive one,” he said. “Hate
is the opposite of that liberal tradition of inclusivity. So it’s not
surprising to me that people at the SPLC, people at other inclusive
organizations tend to give money to liberal organizations. It seems obvious to
me.”
The “alt-left” has been around for decades, but
conservatives have remained ignorant. Now, WND takes you inside antifa with an exclusive
special report revealing the origins, motivations and future of America’s most
widespread and active domestic terrorist group. Get your FREE copy of “Antifa: What Americans
Need to Know about the Alt-Left.”
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The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) got its start
during the Civil Rights movement of the ‘70s. In those days the SPLC was a hero
for targeting racist organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), Neo-Nazi
groups (e.g. Aryans and Skin Heads) and other racist hate groups. Good stuff,
right?
Well the major victories of the Civil Rights movement at
least on legal ground has leveled the playing field in the rule of law.
Certainly racism still exists in America, but racial minorities have the law on
their side to prevent racial exploitation on an overt basis. The racism that is
growing now in the America is largely the result of Left-Wing groups stirring
up strife with race-baiting in an effort to gain votes. Leftist race-baiting
has been a political instrument for the last couple of decades to hinder
traditional American values that began to regain sway with the Presidential
Administrations of Reagan, Bush II and now populist Conservatism with the
surprise election of President Donald Trump.
Since the Left can hardly believe they lost to President
Trump, they have done everything to lie, obstruct and manufacture anti-Trump
accusations ever since that first Tuesday in November 2016.
The SPLC is doing their part for the Left by labeling
Biblical Family Values organizations as hate groups. There are several groups
on the SPLC so-called hate list that are simply Biblical Christian or telling
the truth about Islam that I am not going to name here. The Christian ones of
interest to me are the Liberty Counsel (LC), Family
Research Council (FRC) and American Family Association
(AFA).
If I had time I could point out Counterjihad writers and
organizations that simply expose the darker nature of Islam that the Left
refuses to expose and way too many Conservatives are hesitant to expose out of
fear of organizations like the SPLC labeling them Islamophobic haters.
For both Christians and Counterjihadists, the SPLC
hate-labels are merely to turn the relatively uninformed public against what is
correct and moral by calling the good as evil.
The Conservapedia entry for the SPLC provides a great
synopsis of the organization’s hatred of all things American Patriotic,
Christian and Counterjihad in the first couple of paragraphs – READ the entire
entry:
The Southern Poverty Law
Center is a far-Left legal and activist organization created in 1971 in
Montgomery, Alabama. It
was founded by trial lawyers Morris Dees and Joe Levin, and its first president
was civil rights leader Julian Bond, who would later take control of the NAACP. SPLC supports a wide variety of liberal positions;
it is pro-immigration (both
legal and illegal),
advocates multiculturalism and
the homosexual
agenda, supports Muslims and racial preferences and defendants' rights,
and advocates against what it considers "hate groups". In 2012, Black
pastors confronted the Southern Poverty Law Center for smearing as "hate
groups" pro-family organizations opposed to the homosexual agenda.[1] Reverend Dr. Patrick
Wooden admonished the SPLC in declaring that it is wrong to compare "my
beautiful blackness" with homosexual perversion.[2]
The SPLC's op-ed writings have
appeared in the Communist
Party USA's newspaper People's World.[3] This
"controversial, liberal organization" [4] has been criticized
in mainstream press for being extravagant in its spending, and using charges of
racism to stifle conservatives.[5] (Southern Poverty Law Center; Conservapedia; page was last modified on 21 July
2017, at 22:33)
The Liberty Counsel has been blistered by the SPLC so often
that they have been the subject of multiple hate-accusations trying to
discredit and ruin the Christian Family Values advocate organization. It has
led Mat Staver to ask for legal defense aid several times a week to battle in
civil suit beginning with NGO expert Guidestar that used the SPLC hate-list.
An article from 7/2/17 I found on American Civil Rights
Union (ACRU not to be confused with Leftist ACLU):
Frustrated by its inability to win
elections, the left is attempting to silence opponents through intimidation,
either in the streets or in the courts.
The latest example is the hijacking of Guidestar USA by the Southern Poverty
Law Center (SPLC).
Guidestar is a database of more
than 2 million nonprofit and non-governmental (NGO) organizations. It’s
considered the foremost authority on nonprofits, and had a self-avowed
reputation for “remaining neutral.”
That changed when a left-wing
activist, Jacob Harold, came aboard in 2012. Mr. Harold, whose bio boasts of
donating to the Obama campaign, extensive activism on behalf of climate change
groups, and hosting a NARAL Pro-Choice D.C. men’s event, tweeted a photo of
himself holding a sign protesting President Trump at the radical Women’s March
in January.
Apart from Vermont ice cream
magnates Ben and Jerry, it might be hard to find a more radically leftist major
CEO. So it’s no wonder that Mr. Harold welcomed the Southern Poverty Law Center
as an authority on “hate groups.” Using SPLC’s “hate map” as a resource,
Guidestar smeared 46 organizations, many of them Christian, as “hate groups.”
The Southern Poverty Law Center has
a long history of abusing nonprofits and individuals with whom they disagree.
They tar innocent people and may have inspired at least two terrorist
incidents. The SPLC’s “hate map” lumps Christian and conservative organizations
with neo-Nazis, skinheads and other violence-prone groups. … (Silencing the Silencers; By Robert Knight; ACRU; 7/2/17)
And from Christianity Today:
A venerable Christian ministry
based in Fort Lauderdale recently saw its name listed on a CNN map of “all the
active hate groups where you live,” as well as in local news reports as the No.
1 hate group in Florida.
…
“Enough is enough,” said Frank
Wright, president of D. James Kennedy Ministries, which filed a lawsuit against
the SPLC on Wednesday. The organization also sued GuideStar and AmazonSmile for
their use of the SPLC list.
…
The SPLC recently received a prominent boost from Apple, which pledged a $1
million donation and will launch a new feature to allow users to donate
directly from iTunes.
…
D. James Kennedy
Ministries—formerly called Truth in Action—claims that the SPLC falsely labeled
it as a hate group with the intention to hurt its reputation and fundraising
efforts, according to a 39-page lawsuit filed in federal district court in
Alabama (where the SPLC is headquartered).
The suit alleges that the
ministry’s inclusion on the list of hate groups amounts to defamation—spreading
false, harmful information—as well as a trademark violation, misrepresenting
the ministry in order to drum up fundraising support. Wednesday’s filing made
the same claims against the charity-research site GuideStar for promoting the
SPLC designation, seeking an injunction against further use of the “hate group”
label and damages from both organizations.
Wanting to call out “hateful
rhetoric” during a “highly politicized moment,” GuideStar recently added the SPLC designations onto
its profile pages—including for Christian nonprofits who stand for traditional
marriage like the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), Liberty Counsel, the Family
Research Council (FRC), and the American Family Association—then removed the
hate labels after backlash in June. The controversy made many of these groups,
their leaders, and their supporters even more upset over the prominence of the
SPLC’s categorizations. (D. James Kennedy Ministries Sues SPLC over
Hate Map; By KATE SHELLNUTT; Christianity
Today; 8/24/17 10:20 AM)
From WND:
…
The case alleges that the
defendants — online retailer Amazon, online charity reporting company
Guidestar and SPLC — damaged the ministries by creating, publishing and
promoting SPLC’s infamous “hate” designations.
The hate designations already have
prompted a lawsuit by Liberty Counsel against Guidestar. And several
organizations, including the Alliance Defending Freedom, have demanded
broadcasters retract reports quoting SPLC’s hate designations.
The case seeks an award for
“special harms from the SPLC” over the groups’ rejection by the
AmazonSmile program due to the hate designations.
…
“It is the SPLC’s intent that the
people who receive the information that SPLC publishes about the ministry will
rely on SPLC’s information as fact and will base their charitable giving
decisions on that information.”
For its part, GuideStar “knowingly
accepts defamatory information from the SPLC regarding the ministry and
knowingly, intentionally, and purposefully republishes that defamatory
information with the intent that the people who receive the republished SPLC
information from GuideStar will rely on that information as fact for the
purpose of making their charitable giving decsisions [sic].”
The case alleges defamation against
SPLC and GuideStar: “SPLC’s very purpose for placing the ministry on the Hate
Map was to harm the reputation of the ministry as to lower it in the estimation
of the community and to deter third persons from associating or dealing with
the ministry.”
…
Liberty Counsel, a
nonprofit that advocates for civil and religious rights, sued GuideStar over
its use of SPLC’s “hate” labels, explaining the actions resulted in death
threats to employees and other harm.
“Liberty Counsel has been forced to
provide additional security because of the significant threat that GuideStar’s
false and defamatory statement has caused. Violent extremists have relied on
the false and defamatory statement to commit acts of terrorism and violence
against innocent people who merely happen to hold a different viewpoint on
certain issues than GuideStar,” Liberty Counsel said.
Liberty Counsel pointed out that
SPLC “hate” designations already have been linked to two attempted mass
murders: the attack by Corkins on the Washington office of Family Research
Council and the shooting attack this summer near the capital that severely
injured Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La. (LEFT-WING GROUPS SUED FOR VIOLATING
CHRISTIANS' CIVIL RIGHTS; By BOB
UNRUH; WND; 8/22/17 8:39 PM)
From Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF):
…
SPLC’s word-weapon of choice is
“hate.” It uses the H-word to harpoon victims through a “Hate Map” – a
cluttered visual surrounded by sobering images such as a “hate-graph” and
clenched fist symbols. Percentages purportedly communicating something really
serious about “hate” assault the viewer’s senses in size 72 font.
The map’s approach is
indiscriminate, by design. It mixes the likes of the KKK, “Racist Skinhead(s),”
and “Neo-Nazi(s)” with groups holding traditional views of human sexuality.
Quaint notions on the meaning of marriage, rooted in longstanding religious
beliefs, receive special hostility. Never mind that less than 10 years ago
nearly every major political figure in the country, including President Obama,
said marriage was a union of one man and one woman. Many of those folks are
given a pass, however, because their views on that issue have since “evolved.”
But the SPLC dictates - because it
says so - that those who failed to evolve (some might say “retained their
convictions”) are now the functional equivalent of skinheads. Just picture those
scary traditional marriage types, roaming the streets with chains, looking for
a good fight. This would be a ludicrous and even laughable attempt at
equivalency, if not for the harm it does to people of good will (to say nothing
of the damage to public discourse).
Mat Staver of the Liberty Counsel not only is
involved in the civil suit against the SPLC, Guidestar and etc., but they are
also publicizing some dirt on the SPLC to demonstrate how nefarious the Leftist
organization is:
I have some breaking news on
the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) that gives us a window of opportunity to
expose the SPLC for what it is — a massive, money-making machine of the radical
left that is aggressively targeting pro-faith and pro-family organizations.
On Thursday, The
Washington Free Beacon exposed the SPLC’s ongoing practice of
funneling many millions of dollars into offshore accounts, where it apparently
is stockpiling vast sums of money.
+ + Why is the SPLC stockpiling
millions overseas?
This practice of stockpiling
millions of dollars in overseas, unregulated bank accounts is highly unusual
for a U.S. non-profit and blows the SPLC’s cover as allegedly being a
legitimate, grassroots organization. Instead, as Liberty Counsel has reported,
the SPLC is a vast enterprise with hundreds of millions of dollars that is
pushing an anti-faith, anti-family agenda that threatens every American’s
liberties! Now that the SPLC’s unethical and unregulated “offshore” money has
come to light, we must do everything in our power to fight back against their
“fake hate” campaign and overcome their outrageous lies once and for all!
That’s why I’m asking for your help
right now…
Over the past few weeks, the SPLC
has blatantly “leveraged” the Charlottesville tragedy to expand its “fake hate”
campaign. As I have been reporting, this has resulted in an AVALANCHE of
attacks against Liberty Counsel and a massive increase in
funding to the SPLC from commercial entities like Apple, JP Morgan, and others.
…
With this revelation of SPLC offshore
bank accounts stockpiling millions of dollars, we must move quickly to expand
our efforts to both expose the SPLC’s deceptions and defeat the SPLC’s attacks.
…
The SPLC is at the forefront of a
very strategic effort to equate Christian and family values with “hate.”
Their attacks have multiplied in recent weeks. But right now, I believe
we have a unique opportunity to both expose their lies and defeat the SPLC’s
twisted strategy. I can’t do this without your help. Please take a moment right
now to consider how you can help. And thengo here to make your best
possible gift. …
(BREAKING: SPLC stashing millions offshore!
(Liberty Counsel); By Mat Staver; Liberty Counsel Connect; 9/2/17 7:48 pm)
And I leave you with PJ Media piece on the hypocrisy of the
SPLC.
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has gained traction
in recent weeks, but contrary to media reports, the group does not exist to
"monitor hate groups" but to destroy groups that it targets for
"strictly ideological" reasons. In light of large donations from
Apple, J.P. Morgan, and George Clooney, and CNN's favorable coverage of the
SPLC, Americans should learn the real motivations behind this far-left
organization.
In the words of SPLC former spokesman Mark Potok (who spent
20 years as a senior fellow at the SPLC and only retired this year, according to LinkedIn), the
group does not exist to monitor hate groups.
"Sometimes the press will describe us as monitoring
hate groups, I want to say plainly that our aim in life is to destroy these
groups, completely destroy them," Potok declared at an event in Michigan
in 2007.
Mark Potok from the Southern
Poverty Law Center Speaks at the 2007 MIAAHC Hate Crimes Conference
Potok reiterated this point at a Vermont school group in
2008. "You are able to destroy these groups sometimes by the things you
publish," he declared. "It's not so much that they will bring down
the police or the federal agents on their head, it's that you can sometimes
so mortally embarrass these groups that they will be
destroyed" (emphasis added).
The SPLC "mortally embarrasses" groups by equating
mainstream conservative, Christian, and other organizations with the Ku Klux
Klan and white supremacists. Make no mistake, this is not a "hate group
monitoring" organization, it's a far-Left defamation racket that exists to
target any group it disagrees with politically.
"We see this political struggle," Potok added in
his 2008 Vermont speech. "We're not trying to change anybody's mind. We're
trying to wreck the groups. We're trying to destroy them. Not to send them to
prison unfairly or to take their free speech rights away, but as a political
matter to destroy them."
In yet another 2008 speech, Potok explained the SPLC criteria for a "hate group." The
spokesman said, "Our criteria for a 'hate group,' first of all, have
nothing to do with criminality, or violence, or any kind of guess we're making
about 'this group could be dangerous.' It's strictly ideological"
(emphasis added).
Here's the criteria:
"So we look at a group and we say, 'Does this group, in its platform
statements, or the speeches of its leader or leaders — Does this group say that
a whole group of people, by virtue of their group characteristics, is somehow
less?"
The SPLC's actions have revealed what "group
characteristics" means. The "hate group" list features
Christian organizations like D. James Kennedy Ministries, the Family Research Council (FRC), Liberty Counsel, the American
Family Association (AFA), and Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF),
along with other groups like the American College of Pediatricians and the
Center for Immigration Studies. It also lists Muslim reformer Maajid Nawaz and women's rights
activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali as "anti-Muslim extremists."
If an organization disagrees with LGBT activism, it is a
"hate group," because in the eyes of the SPLC belief in traditional
marriage equates to stigmatizing gay people. If an organization or an
individual warns against radical Islamic terrorism, that person or group is
"hateful" because in the eyes of the SPLC it has stigmatized all
Muslims, even if the person is a Muslim himself.
The SPLC's broad definition of a "hate group" is
exceedingly important, because this "hate" labeling has inspired at
least one terror attack.
In the summer of 2012, the SPLC's "hate map"
inspired Floyd Lee Corkins III to break into the Family Research Council (FRC),
a Christian nonprofit in Washington, D.C. Corkins aimed to murder everyone in
the building, and he later pled guilty to
committing an act of terrorism. He was sentenced to 25 years in
prison.
During an FBI interrogation, the terrorist said he targeted
FRC because it was listed as an "anti-gay group" on the SPLC website.
Nor was the 2012 attack the only terrorist event involving
the SPLC. Earlier this summer, Bernie Sanders supporter James Hodgkinson shot
people at a Republican Congressional Baseball Game practice, nearly killing
Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.) Hodgkinson "liked" the SPLC on Facebook.
The group had repeatedly tarred
Scalise for a speech he gave to a white supremacist group, even after Scalise apologized (and
was called a "sellout" by former KKK leader David Duke).
This connection to terror is particularly troubling,
considering the SPLC's most recent "hate map" — a diagram
showing every single Confederate monument across
the United States, which also includes elementary schools, middle
schools, and high schools. The SPLC warned of "turmoil and bloodshed"
should these statues not be taken down.
The Southern Poverty Law Center has
warned of 'turmoil' with new map identifying Confederate monuments, cities and
middle schools. But is SPLC also part of the problem? #Tucker
The group has also been rather slow to admit fault and
remove innocent towns from the "hate map" that inspired the FRC
shooting. The SPLC falsely listed the historic Iowa town of
Amana Colonies as the home of the notorious white supremacist website Daily
Stormer. When challenged, the group argued that Daily Stormer writers had met
for a book club in one of the town's restaurants. The SPLC finally
removed the town this week.
In spite of all this, the SPLC has been raking in the cash
after the riots in Charlottesville, Va. George Clooney and his
wife Amalpledged $1 million to the group, and the company J.P. Morgan pledged
$500,000. Apple CEO Tim Cook was even more generous, announcing
his company would give $1 million to the SPLC and that it would set up a system
in iTunes software to let consumers directly donate to the organization.
Earlier this month, Lyft announced it
would partner with the SPLC "to provide educational resources for
drivers." MGM Resorts announced that
it would match employee contributions to the SPLC dollar-for-dollar. Some
companies already follow this policy.
According to an analysis by Second Vote provided to PJ
Media, companies such as Disney, Kraft Heinz, Charles Schwab, Progressive
Insurance, Shell, and Verizon have matched their employees' small-dollar
donations to the SPLC. The big offenders are: Pfizer, which gave the SPLC
$8,919.5 in 2013 and 2015 combined; Bank of America, which gave the SPLC $9,310
between 2013 and 2015; and Newman's Own, which gave the group $50,000 between
2013 and 2015.
Each of these contributions pale in comparison to the gifts
from George Clooney, J.P. Morgan, and Apple, but they are still noteworthy.
To make matters worse, the SPLC does not need any of this
money. The group is a cash cow, recording more than $50 million in
contributions and $328 million in net assets (according to its 2015 Form 990). The
Washington Free Beacon reported multiple transactions to foreign entities,
including two cash payments of $2.2 million to funds in the
Cayman Islands.
"The SPLC depicts itself as a big champion of rights,
but it's become a champion of wrongs," Dan Gainor, vice president of
Business and Culture at the Media Research Center, told PJ Media in an email
statement. "It is no longer the civil rights era group that many of its
supporters believe. It now exists largely to attack groups it doesn't agree
with and to fundraise millions and millions of dollars off of uninformed
donors."
Gainor warned that "the media make this far worse by
legitimizing the group's so-called 'hate list.' In reality, that list is a
bizarre mix of good conservative groups and disturbing fringe organizations.
The SPLC sees no difference between a group defending the rights of Christians
in court and the Klan."
"The media credential this awful hate group and rarely
report that some of the SPLC's biggest fans are dangerous criminals,"
Gainor added. He mentioned Floyd Lee Corkins and James Hodgkinson.
Apple, J.P. Morgan, George Clooney, Lyft, MGM Resorts, and
any organization that partners with the SPLC should know what it's getting
into.
Corporate America should not support a group that exists to
tar mainstream organizations as "hate groups," inciting violence
against them. It should not bankroll an organization that targets innocent
towns and elementary schools as purveyors of hate. It should not support a
"poverty" organization that sends millions of dollars to accounts in
the Cayman Islands. Enough is enough.
Brigitte Gabriel recently addressed the gathering of pastors attending the annual Family Research Council "Watchmen on the Wall” event. She gave a fantastic speech about the dangers facing our country from radical Islam, and what we must do as a nation to confront this very real threat.
ACT for America's president and founder, Brigitte Gabriel tells her story about how radical Islam changed her life as a child in Lebanon forever. May her story serve as a warning to the rest of the world.
ACT for America 869 Lynnhaven Parkway, Suite 113, #411 Virginia Beach, VA 23452
About ACT for America ·ACT for America is the largest and the only grassroots organization dedicated to national security and defeating terrorism. Today, ACT for America has expanded to 890 chapters and 280,000 members with a goal of 2,500 chapters and 1,000,000 members by the end of the decade.
·ACT for America is a non-partisan organization whose mission appeals to every American concerned about national security and terrorism -a powerful, organized, informed and mobilized voice.
·ACT for America educates citizens and elected officials to help impact national security policy & stands ready to take action as the only national security grassroots organization in America.
Who We Are
We are all Americans first -citizens who put their differences aside and came together to secure our country. Every American has one thing in common – “we are all interested” in keeping our homes, communities, states, and nation safe. What makes ACT for America different is that our members and supporters come from every background, age, gender, race, social status, political point of view, and lifestyle choice. Remember, national security is not a conservative, liberal, or libertarian issue - it's an American issue.
What We Do
ACT for America is continuing to expand its nationwide volunteer chapter network that trains citizens to recognize and help prevent criminal activity and terrorism in the United States while preserving civil liberties protected by the United States Constitution.
ACT for America focuses on activities that enhance the national security standing of the United States — such as educating elected officials from the school board level to Congress. Many of these officials go on to pass vital legislation to this end. ACT has driven the education process towards the successful passage of 37 bills in 19 states over the last six years.
Brigitte Gabriel is the Founder and President of Act for America. Ms. Gabriel is one of the leading national security experts in the world -providing information and analysis on the rise of Islamic terrorism. Ms. Gabriel lectures nationally and internationally about national security and current affairs. Her expertise is sought after by world and business leaders. Ms. Gabriel has addressed the United Nations, the Australian Prime Minister, members of the British Parliament/House of Commons, members of the United States Congress, the Pentagon, the Joint Forces Staff College, the U.S. Special Operations Command, the U.S. Asymmetric Warfare group, the FBI, and many others. In addition, Ms. Gabriel is a regular guest analyst on Fox News Channel, CNN, MSNBC, and various radio stations daily across America. She serves on the board of advisers of the Intelligence Summit.
Ms. Gabriel is the author of two New York Times Best Sellers, BECAUSE THEY HATE and THEY MUST BE STOPPED. Ms. Gabriel is named one of the top 50 most prominent speakers in America. She speaks Arabic, French, English and Hebrew.
