Staff and leadership at the radical Southern Poverty Law Center have frequently visited the Biden White House, according to White House visitor logs. Collaboration between the federal government and the SPLC should alarm Americans as the federal government ramps its weaponization of domestic law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
White House records show that members of the SPLC have visited the White House at least 11 times over the short span of three years. These meetings mostly involved Biden himself, referred to as “POTUS”—an acronym for “president of the United States”—and typically featured officials from his Cabinet. These frequent consultations indicate that the Left and the Biden administration continue to collaborate closely in the hunt for so-called hate groups.
As this article’s co-author Tyler O’Neil wrote in his book “Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center,” the SPLC has leveraged its history in suing the Klu Klux Klan into bankruptcy by branding mainstream conservative and Christian groups “hate groups,” placing them on a map with KKK chapters.
SPLC Chief Policy Officer LaShawn Warren most recently visited the White House to meet with POTUS on Feb. 16, 2023. Shortly afterward the White House tapped the SPLC to serve on a coalition curbing antisemitism. Brandon Jones, SPLC’s director of political campaigns, met with Amanda Trocola, deputy social secretary to the vice president, in December 2022; and Joseph Levin, emeritus member of the SPLC’s board of directors, twice met with Cynthia Bernstein, the director of management and administration for the Office of the Vice President.
A Jan. 6 meeting between SPLC Intelligence Project Director Susan Corke and National Security Council Counterterrorism Director John Picarelli garnered more public attention, considering the SPLC’s later decision to add parental rights groups to its “hate map.” The project the SPLC launched to monitor the Klan, the Intelligence Project, now publishes the “hate map.”
The Corke meeting occurred six months prior to the SPLC’s public condemnation of grassroots parent groups such as Moms for Liberty and Parents Defending Education. The SPLC listed these parental rights groups on its “hate map” in the company of neo-Nazis and the KKK.
As the Biden administration continues to meet with SPLC members, we can expect a second wave of persecution targeted at mainstream Christian and conservative groups.
SPLC advocacy has been associated with several violent conflicts on the national stage, including but not limited to a physical assault on American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray. Prior to the attack, the SPLC frivolously labeled Murray a “white nationalist,” isolating him as a target for extreme leftist groups. As a result, a mob physically assaulted Murray and severely injured one of his colleagues.
Similarly, a gunman confessed that the SPLC’s “hate map” inspired him orchestrate a shooting of the Family Research Council headquarters in 2012. A security guard heroically apprehended the gunman but got shot in the process. Despite these events, to date, the SPLC has kept FRC on its “hate map.”
In more recent news, SPLC lawyer Thomas Webb Jurgens faces domestic terrorism charges after police arrested him following a violent barrage of Molotov cocktails and rocks thrown at an Atlanta police training facility. The agitators, including Jurgens, destroyed multiple pieces of construction equipment at the facility critics brand “Cop City.” The agitators did not injure anyone, but police said the situation created a threat of grave bodily harm. The SPLC stated that Jurgens “was performing a public service, documenting potential violations of protesters’ rights.”
Public scrutiny has raised certain questions about the SPLC’s motives and institutional integrity. In 2019, the SPLC fired its co-founder, Morris Dees, due to reported workplace misconduct including racial discrimination and sexual harassment. O’Neil’s book, referenced above, recognizes that Dees’ personal missteps seem somewhat representative of the SPLC’s shortcomings as an organization.
Indeed, Bob Moser, a former SPLC employee who left the center amid Dees’ dismissal, publicly admitted that the SPLC has been running a cash-grab scheme disguised as a noble effort for racial justice. Moser described the SPLC’s “hate” accusations as a “highly profitable scam.”
In the wake of these appalling incidents the SPLC has faced several defamation lawsuits over its erroneous accusations.
The SPLC paid a large settlement to Muslim reformer Maajid Nawaz after condemning him as an “Anti-Muslim Extremist.” Additionally, D.A. King’s Dustin Inman Society cleared a major hurdle in its defamation lawsuit, which now enters the discovery phase. The SPLC previously and publicly stated that the Dustin Inman Society was, in fact, not a “hate group” before it conveniently switched footing as the two organizations politically locked horns.
In fact, Moser previously worked on King’s profile for the SPLC’s Intelligence Project and at that time he admitted that the first iteration of King’s organization was not a hate group.
The federal government continues to rely on the SPLC despite the organization’s questionable methods and unpalatable track record. This trend raises serious concerns about future domestic policy under the Biden administration, especially in the light of new regulations on school curriculum and gender issues. The Biden administration also has a track record of targeting concerned parents and working with third parties to compare them to domestic terrorists.
SPLC Visitation Index
- Warren, LaShawn with POTUS on Feb. 16, 2023
- Corke, Susan with John Picarelli on Jan. 6, 2023
- Levine, Joseph with Cynthia Bernstein on Dec. 30, 2022
- Levine, Joseph with Cynthia Bernstein on Dec. 28, 2022
- Jones, Brandon with Amanda Trocola on Dec. 6, 2022
- Anderson, Kirsten with POTUS on Nov. 30, 2022
- Warren, LaShawn with POTUS on Sept. 15, 2022
- Bekenstein, Joshua with POTUS on Sept. 13, 2022
- Levine, Joseph with POTUS on July 4, 2022
- Clanton, Waikinya with POTUS on April 8, 2022
- Huang, Margaret with POTUS on May 20, 2021
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