The Conversation: Trump administration's indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center breaks with norms – and may lack evidence of criminal wrongdoing
The Southern Poverty Law Center was indicted on April 21, 2026, on federal fraud charges. The Justice Department alleges that the civil rights group improperly raised millions of dollars to secretly pay leaders of the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist and extremist groups for inside information.
The Justice Department alleges that the SPLC, based in Montgomery, Alabama, and founded in 1971, defrauded its donors by making “materially false representations and omissions about what the donated funds would be used for.”
Following the indictment, the SPLC said it “will vigorously defend ourselves, our staff, and our work” against what it described as false allegations.
The Conversation U.S. asked Beth Gazley, an Indiana University scholar of nonprofits and civil society, to explain the significance of this indictment and to put it into the broader context of the Trump administration’s actions regarding some nonprofits.
