Southern Poverty Law Center Confirms Under Investigation by Department of Justice

The Justice Department is reportedly investigating the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) over its past use of paid informants, according to the organization’s interim CEO Bryan Fair. In a video released Tuesday on the organization’s YouTube channel, Fair disclosed that while full details remain unclear, the investigation appears to focus on how the nonprofit gathered intelligence on violent extremist groups.

“Although we don’t know all the details,” Fair stated, “the focus appears to be on the SPLC’s prior use of paid confidential informants to gather credible intelligence on extremely violent groups.”

The SPLC, a civil rights organization known for tracking hate groups, has faced increasing criticism in recent years over allegations of political bias in its classifications. The group maintained that information gathered through its informant program was routinely shared with federal and local law enforcement agencies, including the FBI. Fair emphasized that the organization no longer employs paid informants.

The announcement comes amid growing tensions between the SPLC and the Trump administration. In October, FBI Director Kash Patel severed all ties with the organization shortly after the SPLC designated Turning Point USA as a hate group.

“The Southern Poverty Law Center long ago abandoned civil rights work and turned into a partisan smear machine,” Patel stated on social media platform X. “Their so-called ‘hate map’ has been used to defame mainstream Americans and even inspired violence. That disgraceful record makes them unfit for any FBI partnership.”

Fair suggested in his statement that the DOJ investigation is politically motivated, pointing to Patel’s decision to cut ties with the organization and citing a December hearing held by the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government titled “Partisan and profitable: the SPLC’s influence on federal civil rights policy.”

The controversy intensified following the assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk in September. Just one day before Kirk was killed, the SPLC published a newsletter that Kirk’s producer, Andrew Kolvet, characterized as an attack on the organization.

In May 2025, the SPLC had published an analysis classifying Turning Point USA as a hate group, describing it as a “well-funded, hard-right organization with links to Southern Poverty Law Center-identified hard-right extremists.” The analysis further claimed the group’s “primary strategy is sowing and exploiting fear that white Christian supremacy is under attack by nefarious actors, including immigrants, the LGBTQ+ community and civil rights activists.”

Kolvet questioned whether the SPLC’s classification and newsletter contributed to the motives behind Kirk’s assassination. “Did these contribute to the assassin’s motive?” Kolvet wrote in October. “We may never know, but the swirl of extremist propaganda certainly played a role.”

The SPLC has faced other controversies in recent years. Critics have accused the organization of mishandling donations, union-busting, and covering up sexual assault allegations against senior leadership, all while maintaining nearly $1 billion in financial reserves.

The group, headquartered in Montgomery, Alabama, was founded in 1971 and initially gained prominence for its legal victories against white supremacist organizations. In recent decades, it expanded its mission to track and report on what it identifies as hate groups across the political spectrum.

Neither the Department of Justice nor the Southern Poverty Law Center has provided additional comment on the reported investigation. The scope and potential implications of the investigation remain unclear, though it marks a significant development in the ongoing scrutiny of one of the country’s most prominent civil rights organizations.