Southern Poverty Law Center says its informant program was not kept secret from law enforcement

ABC NewsLiveVideoShowsShopInterest Successfully AddedWe'll notify you here with news aboutTurn on desktop notifications for breaking stories about interest? OffOnStream onSouthern Poverty Law Center says its informant program was not kept secret from law enforcementThe Southern Poverty Law Center has told a federal court that law enforcement agencies knew for years that the nonprofit was paying informants to report on the movements of hate groupsByCOLLIN BINKLEY Associated PressApril 28, 2026, 9:00 AM1:52Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche listens during a news conference at the Justice Department, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)The Associated PressWASHINGTON -- The Southern Poverty Law Center told a federal court on Tuesday that law enforcement agencies have long known that the nonprofit paid informants to report on the movements of hate groups, rejecting assertions by the Trump administration that the nonprofit steered money to the Ku Klux Klan and other extremist groups without the knowledge of authorities.The Alabama-based nonprofit was indicted last week on charges of fraud and money laundering. Prosecutors said the group misled donors by using their money to pay informants who served as leaders in the very hate groups the organization was founded to fight.In its first legal defense against the charges, the group filed motions in federal court in Alabama asking the court to order acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to retract statements saying the government had “no information” about the informant program, and to block him from making further similar statements. Blanche made the comment in a press conference last week and later on Fox News as he announced charges against the nonprofit.The filings detail three instances in which the SPLC says information from its informant program was shared with law enforcement to help stop the activities of racist groups. Attorneys for the SPLC presented information from at least one of those cases during an April meeting with prosecutors, attorneys said. The group asked Blanche for a retraction after he said authorities had been kept in the dark, but the government declined, according to the group.“The Department of Justice is well aware that the SPLC provided helpful information, through the use of its confidential informants, to law enforcement,” the group said in its filing. “The Department of Justice also knows that these confidential informants helped law enforcement put violent extremists in jail.”Lawyers for the group said Blanche's comments could taint the jury pool and compromise the group's right to a fair trial.President Donald Trump has seized on the case, calling SPLC one of the “greatest political scams in American History” and connecting it to his false claims that he won the 2020 election. Critics have called it a politically motivated prosecution that weaponizes the Justice Department to punish opponents of conservatives.The indictment accuses the group of secretly promoting racist groups while publicly saying it was fighting them. For example, prosecutors said an SPLC-paid informant helped plan the 2017 white nationalist “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and attended the rally at the direction of the SPLC.But in its filings, the SPLC said it sent a 45-page “event alert” to the FBI in advance of the rally with information gathered from the informant program, including information about some attendees’ weapons.In one 2019…

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