SPLC Indicted for Funding White Supremacists

0:00Federal officials just dropped a massive indictment on the Southern Poverty Law Center, hitting them with 11 counts of wire fraud, bank fraud, and conspiracy to launder money. FBI Director Cash Patel and Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche say the group funneled over $3 million from 2014 to $2,023 straight to folks in white supremacist outfits like the Ku Klux Klan and National Socialist Movement. They pulled it off using fake shell companies with no real employees or purpose, bouncing cash through sham accounts onto prepaid cards to hide where. It came from. Prosecutors claim this was the total opposite of what donors thought their money was for, supposedly fighting hate, but actually bankrolling it. The SPLC tracks far-right extremism and pushes civil rights, but critics have long called them out for slapping hate labels on conservative groups. They dislike. Now, their CEO Brian Fair fires back, saying this is the Justice Department getting weaponized

1:01against Trump opponents and folks defending vulnerable. Communities, they're vowing not to back down. Digging deeper, the charges points of payments like $270,000 to a unite the right rally organizer in Charlottesville and over 1 million bucks to a neo-Nazi informant who swiped records from their group. Other payout of $6,000 allegedly covered up that theft. This ramps up the bad blood between the SPLC and the Trump team, who see them as a partisan outfit gone rogue. Patel even cut FBI ties last fall. As the case unfolds in Alabama, it's shaking up how we view these watchdog groups and their deep pockets. That wraps Canada News today, brought to you with AI.