The Southern Poverty Law Center, which has unleashed damaging and unsubstantiated claims about conservative organizations as a standard business practice for years, and in fact has been named in at least two lawsuits recently over its alleged defamation of conservatives, now has delivered a letter to Fox News, claiming its reporting defamed the far-left organization.
The SPLC routinely attacks conservatives, such as its labeling the staunchly American values-based Alliance Defending Freedom and Liberty Counsel, and the family promoting Family Research Council as “hate” groups because of their religious beliefs.
SPLC, which has been linked to domestic terrorism and attempted mass murder, claims now that Fox News’ reporting on its activities was “inaccurate, defamatory, and irresponsible.”
The letter from SPLC spokesman James Knoepp to Fox complained that a report on “The Five” incorrectly stated that the organization, with assets in the hundreds of millions of dollars, “provided just $61,000 in ‘legal assistance.'”
SPLC claimed that was its “internal legal services” and that it actually “spent more than $1.8 million on out-of-pocket case costs for litigation brought on behalf of its clients.”
The organization said it worked on a case advocating for better treatment for prisoners and on behalf of vicitims of bail bond companies in Orleans Parish, Louisiana, among others.
“The show also implied there was something nefarious about the fact that the SPLC uses investment vehicles incorporated outside of the United States, going so far as to claim it constituted a money laundering operation,” SPLC said. “As Fox News surely knows, it is common for universities, foundations and other nonprofit organizations to have a portion of their endowments invested in off-shore funds.”
The publicity over the demands by SPLC, which has been sued by conservative organizations over its “hate” labeling, likely didn’t produce the results it had wanted, however.
“Wait, so SPLC is angry at Fox News because people are ‘attacking’ them for wrongly calling them hate groups? Huh. Funny that,” said a post at Twitchy, which monitors Twitter.
SPLC is demanding a correction from FOX News. https://t.co/aIESkf988X
— SPLC (@splcenter) September 8, 2017
SPLC said it is “currently facing a coordinated attack by far-right extremist groups we’ve named as hate groups because they vilify the LGBT community, immigrants and Muslims.”
Twitchy continued, “Maybe if the SPLC didn’t deliberately and wrongfully accuse people of being hate groups?
“Folks don’t seem to have a whole lot of sympathy for them … heh,” said Twitchy, citing Ex-GOP Greg’s comment, “You guys are a joke, and a fraud.”
Multiple writers cited cases in which SPLC has issued “hate” labels, which, in their opinion, were wrong.
“Stop whining,” wrote John Doiron. “You’re attacking normal Americans who don’t buy into you racialist agenda. You are frauds who got caught.”
“Truth hurts,” added Twitchy.
SPLC’s list of “hate groups” has made news in months.
Michael Farris, president and general counsel for ADF, released a statement after Franken blasted ADF indirectly in his criticism of one of President Trump’s judicial nominees.
The Washington Times reported the senator’s mistake arose when he lobbed a charge at Amy Coney Barrett, a nominee for the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Franken complained that her decision to speak at an event sponsored by ADF makes her unfit to sit on a federal appeals court, because of SPLC’s listing of ADF as a “hate” organization.
Barrett, who has spent most of her career as a law professor at Notre Dame, said she hadn’t been aware of any controversy surrounding ADF.
Farris said it’s “deeply regrettable that Sen. Franken is misinformed about our work on behalf of religious freedom, something so ‘extreme’ that even seven justices of the U.S. Supreme Court agreed with our position three months ago in Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Comer.”
“There is a real danger of conflating genuine hate groups, like the Ku Klux Klan, with mainstream religious beliefs that are shared by millions of Americans and people from all walks of life across the world. As a member of Congress, Sen. Franken needs to fact-check before parroting discredited attacks by the Southern Poverty Law Center, a once-proud civil rights organization that is now a left-wing smear machine known to incite violence,” he said.
“Alliance Defending Freedom is the largest religious liberty legal advocacy organization in the world and advocates for the freedom of all people – including Sen. Franken’s constituents – to peacefully live, speak, and work consistently with their convictions without fear of government punishment,” Farris said.
WND reported when Minnesota Majority probed Franken’s 312-vote victory in the U.S. Senate race in Minnesota in 2008. According to records, at least 341 convicted felons voted in Hennepin County, where Minneapolis is located, and another 52 voted illegally in Ramsey County, home to St. Paul.
“The number of felons voting in those two counties alone exceeds … Franken’s victory margin,” the organization reported.
Last week, WND reported conservative leaders sent an open letter to members of the media calling on them to stop using data from the “discredited Southern Poverty Law Center.”
The signers included L. Brent Bozell III of the Media Research Center, Edwin Meese III of the Heritage Foundation, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, Lt. Gen. (Ret.) William Boykin of the Family Research Council, Mat Staver of Liberty Counsel and Michael Farris of Alliance Defending Freedom.
Their message to establishment media: Stop using the “hit pieces” from the Southern Poverty Law Center in your reporting.
Several conservative organizations, including the D. James Kennedy Ministries and Liberty Counsel, have gone to court over SPLC’s “hate” designation.
SPLC also has been linked to domestic terror, in the attack by Floyd Corkins on FRC headquarters in Washington, and the recent attempt by James Hodgkinson to assassinate Rep. Steve Scalise and other Republicans.
SPLC had slammed Scalise for his political views, and Hodgkinson had “liked” the SPLC on Facebook.
An announcement about the letter explains SPLC “has recklessly labeled dozens of mainstream conservative organizations as ‘hate groups.'”
The letter states: “We are writing to you as individuals or as representatives of organizations who are deeply troubled by several recent examples of the media’s use of data from the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). The SPLC is a discredited, left-wing, political activist organization that seeks to silence its political opponents with a ‘hate group’ label of its own invention and application that is not only false and defamatory, but that also endangers the lives of those targeted with it.”
It was in June when SPLC supporter James Hodgkinson shot Scalise, R-La.; Zach Barth, a staff member for Rep. Roger Williams; former congressional staff member Matt Mika; and two U.S. Capitol Police officers at a practice for a charity baseball game.
SPLC had demonized Scalise for promoting white supremacy and inferred “that Rep. Scalise is a so-called ‘hater.'”
The FRC attacker, Corkins, cited SPLC as his inspiration for his going to the Washington offices of the Family Research Council, armed with a gun, intending to kill as many people as he could. He was stopped by a security guard, who was injured.
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SPLC has been so extreme it also got into trouble with the Disciplinary Counsel in the Office of the General Counsel of the Department of Justice under President Obama.
There, SPLC lawyers were sharply rebuked and reprimanded for employing its “hate group” on a conservative advocacy group. The counsel stated that using SPLC’s map “overstepped the bounds of zealous advocacy and was unprofessional.” It continued that such behavior is “uncivil” and “constitutes frivolous behavior and does not aid the administration of justice.”
Just days ago, talk-radio superstar Rush Limbaugh criticized SPLC as “perhaps one of the biggest hate groups on the left.”
“They tar and feather and slander right-wing groups and call them hate groups,” he said. “They’ve got a map on their website, and whenever a right-wing group that says or does anything that the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is a bunch of leftist freaks, all you have to do is disagree with them and you are called a hater.”
Conservatives pointed out that the Army has disassociated from SPLC materials, and the FBI removed the SPLC from a list of trusted resources on its “hate Crimes” page.
SPLC’s agenda also has been criticized as “incredible” by Rev. Franklin Graham, CEO and president of both Samaritan’s Purse and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
“A hate group? Can you believe this – the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala., has labeled a number of Christian groups such as D. James Kennedy Ministries, and the Family Research Council run by my good friend Tony Perkins as ‘hate’ groups. Why?” he wrote on a Facebook post.
