Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center

Advance Praise for Making Hate Pay

Finally! A must-read dive into the sham that is the SPLC. The SPLC has done untold damage to many leading thinkers in areas like the work I have dedicated my life to as a devout Muslim in counter-Islamism. It is long overdue for a journalist to take on the corruption that runs to the core of SPLC in its administration, approach, and propaganda. In the name of fighting hate, they have poisoned the atmosphere of discourse against the ideologies of jihad to the point where partisan and identity politics have completely stifled free speech and respectable journalism. Fear no more. Tyler O’Neil’s book is a must read for those who care about the truth and refuse to treat minorities like our Muslim community with a pathological bigotry of low expectations. Tyler O’Neil’s courageous, investigative journalism is just what the doctor ordered!

—M. Zuhdi Jasser, MD, Founder, President American Islamic Forum for Democracy

"Making Hate Pay is a detailed account exposing the Southern Poverty Law Center for the fraudulent hatemongers they are. Tyler O’Neil makes a solid case for understanding why the ‘hate group’ defamations from this morally bankrupt organization should not be trusted."

—Eric Metaxas, New York Times bestselling author of If You Can Keep It and host of the nationally-syndicated Eric Metaxas Radio Show

"Tyler O’Neil pulls the curtain back on the SPLC, exposing the corruption, hypocrisy, and bigotry of an organization that has become the epitome of the hate they claim to oppose. Making Hate Pay is your premier resource that proves the SPLC has no business being America’s moral compass."

—Matt Margolis, Author of Trumping Obama and The Worst President in History

Tyler O’Neil has written an exhaustive, must-read guide to the most ruthless smear machine in America. The Southern Poverty Law Center weaponizes lies and defames its political opponents to destroy them. O’Neil traces the sordid early history of founder Morris Dees, to the lucrative years of KKK fear-mongering and manufactured hate mapping, to the figurative and literal targeting of Christian conservatives, to the present-day partnership with Silicon Valley to silence patriots online. To fight back, we must know our enemy. Read this book!

—Michelle Malkin, bestselling author of Invasion, Culture of Corruption, and Open Borders, Inc.

The establishment media presents the findings of the Southern Poverty Law Center as if the SPLC were a careful, balanced research organization without any agenda beyond exposing ‘hate groups.’ But in this explosive and much-needed new book, Tyler O’Neil proves that the SPLC is the biggest hate group of all, bent on defaming and destroying organizations that dissent from the hard-Left agenda by smearing them with the ‘hate group’ label. And it works, as the ignorant and timid shy away from the uproar that Leftist groups allied with the SPLC raise over the activities of the groups and individuals that the SPLC smears. But this book exposes just how corrupt and dishonest the SPLC really is, and how it is simply a Stalinist weapon to silence those whom Leftists hate and fear. Best of all, O’Neil provides details about those who are finally fighting back against this sinister organization.

—Robert Spencer, Author of The New York Times bestsellers The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad

A BOMBARDIER BOOKS BOOK

An Imprint of Post Hill Press

ISBN: 978-1-64293-439-7

ISBN (eBook): 978-1-64293-440-3

Making Hate Pay:

The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center

© 2020 by Tyler O’Neil

All Rights Reserved

Cover Design by Cody Corcoran

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author and publisher.

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Post Hill Press

New York • Nashville

posthillpress.com

Published in the United States of America

To my dear daughter Alanna,

Every day, you fill me with joy and inspiration. I see so much intelligent curiosity in you—even at the tender age of six months—and I cannot wait to answer your questions. As you grow and find your voice, I want you to thrive in an America where free speech on controversial topics is encouraged, not bullied into silence and submission; where your faith will be fostered and challenged, not ridiculed; and where you can find bountiful opportunities to speak and serve, even if your opinions are unpopular. This book is an effort to preserve that America for you.

Contents

Introduction: The Face of Hate

Chapter 1: All Hell Breaks Loose

Chapter 2: The Early History of Morris Dees and the SPLC

Chapter 3: The Corruption Emerges

Chapter 4: The Hate Group Strategy

Chapter 5: A Shoddy, Politically Motivated List

Chapter 6: An Attempted Terrorist Attack

Chapter 7: Charlottesville and the SPLC

Chapter 8: The SPLC’s Impact

Chapter 9: Fighting Back

Conclusion

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Endnotes

Introduction

The Face of Hate

JESUS IS ANGRY WITH YOU SINNERS! HELLFIRE AWAITS! HOMO SEX IS SIN!

Posters covered in these words made me cringe at both the Republican and Democratic National Conventions in 2016. Angry Christian protesters were attending both events, holding aggressive signs and yelling into their bullhorns about sin and repentance. They often target lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, angrily demanding they repent. These people are an embarrassment to Christianity.

In fact, when one supporter of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) shouted, You are a disgrace to Jesus! I could not help but agree.¹

The most infamous group behind this kind of protest is the Westboro Baptist Church, which preaches the message God hates fags, a slur against homosexuals. Their website is www.GodHatesFags.com. One of my proudest moments as a journalist involved the Westboro Baptist Church attacking me, a conservative Christian, for attacking their offensive rhetoric.

You using grace to excuse sin & apologizing for God’s holy hate, is as wrong as their uncharitable censoriousness, the Westboro Baptist Church wrote in a tweet attacking me.²

As any non-fringe Christian will tell you, God does NOT have holy hate toward LGBT people. But the Westboro Baptist Church preaches a form of vitriol that verges on incitement against those who disagree with its doctrines. One might almost say it is a hate group.

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), has designated the Westboro Baptist Church a hate group, and I am inclined to agree with them. However, the SPLC made its name by suing the Ku Klux Klan, and its list of hate groups grew out of its efforts against the Klan. I emphatically agree that the Westboro Baptist Church is a vile organization that gives Christians a bad name, but I don’t think I would associate it with the KKK.

Yet the SPLC includes many more organizations on the hate group list, and some organizations are nothing like the Westboro Baptist Church.

The Family Research Council (FRC), for instance, is a nonprofit think tank and advocacy group representing conservative Christians in Washington, D.C., It hosts speaking events, publishes research, and advocates for religious freedom. FRC believes that God loves all people, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity. While this organization disagrees with the LGBT movement, it is a far cry from the Westboro Baptist Church. Yet FRC somehow ended up right next to Westboro on the SPLC hate group list.

I would agree that the Westboro Baptist Church traffics in hate, but what kind of organization can be trusted to be the arbiter of such claims? If nonprofit organizations had to submit their résumés and apply for the position of hate arbiter, what kind of qualifications should Americans consider? What should the job description entail?

Certainly, America’s hate arbiter should be unbiased, willing to call out hate on both sides of the political spectrum. Organizations credibly accused of things like sexual harassment and racial discrimination should be excluded from the process. A tax-exempt group that stores funds in offshore accounts should also be excluded. Such an organization should be responsible with its donors’ funds, spending the vast majority of them on the programs donors intend to support, and spending a small amount on fundraising.

These best practices represent the absolute minimum requirements for America’s hate arbiter. More qualifications, like a clear and unambiguous definition of hate, a history of not falsely accusing people of hate, and the refusal to work with radical organizations possibly connected with terrorist funding networks are also bare minimum requirements.

The SPLC fails on all of these criteria, and then some. The SPLC singles out hate on the far-right but not the far-left. It faced a very public sexual harassment and racial discrimination scandal. It has a history of raising far more money than it spends on programs and keeping millions in Cayman Island accounts. It has a malleable definition of hate that it applies to its political enemies. It has paid millions to settle a defamation lawsuit after acknowledging it falsely accused someone of being an extremist. Former staffers have admitted that the hate accusations leveled by the SPLC are a con,a deceptive scheme to raise money.

Perhaps worst of all, the SPLC’s hate group accusation against FRC actually inspired a deranged man to attempt to kill everyone in the building. That man was convicted on terrorism charges. But the SPLC kept accusing FRC of being a hate group even after the attack.

Of course, this group has free speech. The SPLC has every legal right to attack what it sees as extremism on only one side of the political spectrum. The problem is, so many Americans act as though this group is a neutral and trustworthy organization when it is not.

While the SPLC should be disqualified from the role of America’s hate arbiter, corporations, Big Tech companies, media outlets, and even some government entities have seemingly hired this corrupt organization for that position. Hotel chains, credit card companies, internet platforms, and even one U.S. state have endorsed the SPLC’s hate group labels, effectively blacklisting people, and peaceful organizations, for their political views.

This book explains why those employers are wrong, and why they should fire the SPLC from this important public trust.

While I am inclined to agree with the SPLC that the Westboro Baptist Church is a hate group, I refuse to hire this extremely corrupt organization for the position of America’s hate arbiter, and so should you.

Although the SPLC has indeed done some good work in the past and still does some good work today, it has proven, time and time again, that it cannot be trusted in the business of identifying hate and policing America’s public discourse. Instead, it has abused the trust of gullible donors, media outlets, companies, and states to enrich itself and attack its enemies.

Chapter 1

All Hell Breaks Loose

On March 13, 2019, the Southern Poverty Law Center faced a serious reckoning. That Wednesday, the SPLC fired its co-founder, Morris Dees. The next day, it launched an investigation into workplace culture.³

This was a monumental shake-up. Morris Dees had founded the SPLC in 1971, and he had been at the helm for decades. A prolific direct-mail salesman and fundraiser, Dees essentially built the SPLC. Morris Dees is the Southern Poverty Law Center, said Jim Tharpe, former editor of the Montgomery Advertiser.⁴

The shake-up was far from over. After Dees’s firing, then President Richard Cohen assured America that as a civil rights organization, the SPLC is committed to ensuring that the conduct of our staff reflects the mission of the organization and the values we hope to instill in the world. Yet he refused to specify how Dees failed to reflect that mission. Cohen tried to present the firing as evidence of the SPLC’s moral probity. When one of our own fails to meet those standards, no matter his or her role in the organization, we take it seriously and must take appropriate action, he told the Montgomery Advertiser, the local newspaper for Montgomery, Alabama, where the SPLC is based.

In addition to firing Dees, Cohen announced that the SPLC had brought in an outside organization to conduct a comprehensive assessment of our internal climate and workplace practices, to ensure that our talented staff is working in the environment that they deserve—one in which all voices are heard and all staff members are respected.

One does not fire an organization’s co-founder and announce an outside investigation of its internal workplace culture without a serious scandal. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire—and in this case, the conflagration was particularly embarrassing.

You see, the well-respected civil rights organization that had helped get the first black representatives since Reconstruction elected in the South faced charges of racial discrimination. Also especially embarrassing in the #MeToo era, the organization faced charges of sexual harassment.

Josh Moon, a reporter and columnist at the Alabama Political Reporter, said he had received a number of internal SPLC emails that address the ongoing situation and specifically discuss Dees. Looks like a combination of complaints regarding sexual harassment and racial biases in promotion and hierarchy led to this.⁵

The spark that ignited the near-mutiny at [the] SPLC appears to have been the resignation of senior attorney Meredith Horton, and an email she sent to senior leadership. That email noted the hardships women and employees of color faced at [the] SPLC. It was forwarded by Cohen to all staff with a message that there would be a commitment within[the] SPLC to address these concerns, Moon reported.⁶

Roughly two dozen employees signed a letter and sent it to management and the SPLC’s board of directors, the Los Angeles Times reported. Those employees said they were concerned that internal allegations of mistreatment, sexual harassment, gender discrimination, and racism threaten the moral authority of this organization and [their] integrity along with it.⁷

It was not my decision, what they did, Dees told the Montgomery Advertiser. I wish the center the absolute best. Whatever reasons they had of theirs, I don’t know.

One week later, Cohen himself announced that he would step down and immediately launch a search for an interim president in order to give the organization the best chance to heal. Earlier that week, Rhonda Brownstein, SPLC legal director and a member of its senior leadership staff, also resigned.⁸

This was a full reactor meltdown. The SPLC had lost its co-founder and key fundraiser, its longtime president, and its legal director, in one go. This wasn’t just Dees. This was the organization’s leadership team.

This meltdown ironically fulfilled the demands of former employees who left angry reviews on the confidential employer review site Glassdoor.⁹

Above a certain level, the upper management is incompetent, a former employee wrote in March 2018. They treat non-lawyers like objects and don’t care for feedback or criticism. People are afraid to criticize upper management. Office culture is neglected and thus, turnover is high.

That reviewer encouraged the SPLC to clean house at the top and include lower level workers in logistical and office wide decision making.

In February 2018, another employee wrote that some managers are disorganized and have unreasonable expectations for employees, leading to extremely long workdays, no weekends, and very little control over personal lives.

One current employee gave the organization five stars in October 2017, but that worker gave this advice to management: Do a better job of empowering rank and file.

It seems the SPLC took the advice to clean house at the top. But it remains to be seen whether or not this will translate to empowering the rank and file.

When reached six months later, in August 2019, Dees told me flat out that he was fired for no reason. He suggested the other senior staff must have been at fault.

I was dismissed for no reason, Dees wrote in an email. The next week Richard Cohen and Rhonda Brownstein resigned to keep from getting fired. All I did for the past ten years was call major donors. I was in no way involved with running the Center. I rarely if ever visited our branch offices.

The issue is not me. I assume it was Richard and other managers, he added. I really have no other statement.

Yet it seems quite plausible the issue was Dees, for reasons I will address later.

The Fallout Continues.

The SPLC acted fast. The group brought in Tina Tchen, former First Lady Michelle Obama’s chief of staff. Tchen had recently chaired the Recording Academy’s task force on inclusion and diversity, which was launched to help elevate women after the 2018 Grammy Awards. Tchen also co-founded the Time’s Up Legal Defense Fund to support women experiencing harassment at work.¹⁰

The events of the last week have been an eye-opening reminder that the walk towards justice must sometimes start at your own front door and force you to look at your past so you can improve your future, Bryan Fair, the SPLC’s chairman of the board, said in a message to staff. He insisted that no one’s actions, no matter that person’s position at the SPLC, including those of us on the board, will be exempt from scrutiny and accountability.

Culture in an organization the size of SPLC isn’t really about one person, even as dynamic as Morris Dees, Tchen told the Los Angeles Times. She may have just been trying to justify her investigation, but Tchen may have been hinting that the scandal was far broader than originally reported.

I am honored to be asked by SPLC to do this work, she added. I have admired it from afar for many years. It’s an important civil justice institution in our country.

Yet Tchen also had a skeleton in her closet. Just one month before the SPLC meltdown, Tchen intervened in the case of Empire actor Jussie Smollett.

Smollett claimed that on January 29, 2019, masked white attackers wearing Make America Great Again hats had screamed This is MAGA country! before seizing him, putting a noose around his neck, and pouring an unknown bleach-smelling liquid on him. The story quickly fell apart, however. Why would attackers be loitering outside with a rope past midnight on one of the coldest nights of the year? Temperatures in Chicago dropped lower than Antarctica that week.¹¹

The actor also claimed that the attackers yelled homophobic slurs at him—an act that would have required the attackers to know who he was. In other words, Smollett was trying to force police to believe that he happened to have been attacked by white conservatives who watch Empire on one of the coldest nights of the year. Yet it gets worse: video later emerged showing that after police met Smollett, the actor hesitated to remove the noose from around his neck. Rather than flinging the disgusting object away, it seems the actor wanted to be photographed with it on….¹²

Police eventually turned on Smollett after interviewing two African brothers who confessed to orchestrating the hate hoax. A grand jury returned sixteen felony counts against Smollett for falsely reporting a hate crime and disorderly conduct.¹³ The charges were later dropped under mysterious circumstances. Chicago police have blamed Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, who recused herself from the case, but did not recuse her office.

On February 1, 2019, three days after Smollett reported the attack, Tchen texted Foxx. I wanted to give you a call on behalf of Jussie Smollett and family who I know. They have concerns about the investigation, she wrote.¹⁴

Foxx emailed Tchen later that day. Spoke to Superintendent Johnson. I convinced him to Reach [sic] out to FBI to ask that they take over the investigation. He is reaching out now and will get to me shortly, she wrote.

Tchen seemed to believe Smollett’s extremely implausible story, but more importantly, she tried to get the FBI involved.

It seems a totally inappropriate thing to do, to ask a prosecutor to get involved in a case that early on, Martin Prieb, second vice president of Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) said of Tchen’s actions.¹⁵ Even in the opening days of the investigation, police suspected the story did not add up, Prieb added. I would say that there seemed to be a general sense early on that there were gaping holes in this narrative.

Tchen is investigating the SPLC, an organization that has seized on hate hoaxes convenient for its political narrative and then failed to correct the record later.¹⁶ Her record on trusting Smollett should not inspire confidence in the reliability of her investigation. Indeed, the SPLC’s conservative critics suggested that Tchen would help bury the organization’s skeletons, rather than bring about substantive change.

Instead of taking the opportunity to dig deep and recalibrate, SPLC is proving their critics right, Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council (FRC), a conservative Christian organization often