SPLC arraignment on fraud, money laundering set for May 7

( Post Millennial )

The arraignment hearing for the Department of Justice’s case against the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is scheduled to take place on May 7 in federal court in Montgomery, Alabama.

The SPLC has been accused of operating a network of individuals who were tied to extremist organizations and carried out directives on behalf of the organization while receiving payments. According to the indictment, the alleged activity dates back to the 1980s, and donor funds provided to the SPLC were used to financially support organizers affiliated with hate groups that the organization was simultaneously publicly denouncing.

The alleged concealed payments made by the SPLC were sent to individuals associated with the KKK, National Socialist Movement, the Aryan Nations, and other hate groups. The SPLC has dismissed the indictment as an example of politicized weaponization by the Trump administration.

On Monday, attorneys representing the SPLC filed motions requesting access to grand jury transcripts and seeking a court order directing Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to retract a “false and unfairly prejudicial statement” he made while on Fox News. During an appearance on The Ingraham Angle, Blanch commented on whether the SPLC had shared information gathered through alleged paid informants with law enforcement.

“Well, they communicated when they so chose, with law enforcement over the years. There’s no information that we have that suggests that the money they were paying to these informants and these members of these organizations, they then turned around and shared what they learned with law enforcement. To the contrary, or else we would have known, from their own words, that they had given this money to these guys. And we didn’t know,” Blanche said.

The SPLC disputed Blanche’s claims, and attorney Addy Schmitt requested a retraction, asking the court to require the government to “refrain from making any further false or misleading statements about the allegations in the indictment and abide by the rules prohibiting extrajudicial statements that prejudice SPLC’s right to a fair trial.

The Department of Justice responded by reiterating its prior statements and said the issues at hand will be litigated in court.