Justice Dept. Indicts SPLC, Accuses of Hate Group Funding

0:00It's April 25th. You're listening to Entertainment and Celebrity News today. AI-powered pop culture updates. I'm Cory with the Story. The Justice Department dropped an 11-count indictment on the Southern Poverty Law Center this week. They're accusing the civil rights nonprofit of funneling over $3 million to hate groups like the Ku Klux Klan through wire fraud, false. Bank statements and a money laundering scheme. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch called out the group's monitoring of extremists as fake, claiming paid informants inside those networks actually, propped them up instead of taking them down. Experts are pushing back hard, saying this reeks of hypocrisy since the FBI pays informants to, to bust conspiracies. One former prosecutor called it a clear intimidation play, to drain resources from groups fighting hate. The charges are thin on hard evidence right now, with no hearing set yet, but they tie into a pattern of going after Trump's critics like Komean.

1:00Others, even if cases fizzle. This move could freeze out watchdogs everywhere, letting extremists run freer while the real fight gets bogged down in court.