JAN CRAWFORD, CBS NEWS: 40 years ago, the Southern Poverty Law Center bankrupted the Klan and later recovered millions from neo-Nazi groups with lawsuits representing victims of violence. But Tuesday, the tables turned. The Justice Department charged the organization with fraud for allegedly misleading donors and lying to financial institutions by paying members of violent extremist groups millions of dollars to act as informants.
TODD BLANCHE, ACTING ATTORNEY GENERAL: The SPLC was not dismantling these groups. It was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred.
CRAWFORD: Including the indictment alleges a leader of the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, who, quote, attended the event at the direction of SPLC, made racist postings under the supervision of the SPLC and helped coordinate transportation to the event for several attendees. But law center interim president Brian Fair said the group had long used informants and called the indictment a political attack by the Trump administration.
BRYAN FAIR, INTERIM PRESIDENT, SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER: They have made no secret of who they want to protect and who they want to destroy.
CRAWFORD: Scott Fredrickson questioned the Justice Department’s legal theories.
SCOTT FREDERICKSEN, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Can the federal government persuade a jury that the Southern Poverty Law Center was out there funding extremism for its own purposes, manufacturing racism? That’s hard to believe. Obviously, they’ll have their day in court.
CRAWFORD: But there have been calls to investigate the law center for years. In 1995, the Montgomery Advertiser was the finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for articles alleging that the center was misleading donors and wasting their money. And more recently, critics say that its hate watch list of extremists includes many mainstream conservatives.
