Southern Poverty Law Center charged with defrauding donors with payments to extremist informants

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Southern Poverty Law Center was indicted Tuesday on federal fraud charges alleging it improperly raised millions of dollars to secretly pay leaders of the Ku Klux Klan and other hate groups for inside information, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said.

The Justice Department alleges the civil rights group defrauded donors by using their money to fund the very extremism it claimed to be fighting, with more than $3 million paid to informants through a now-defunct program to infiltrate white supremacist and other extremist groups. Prosecutors allege some of the money was used by extremists to carry out other crimes, but court papers did not include specific examples.

“The SPLC was not dismantling these groups. It was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose by paying sources to stoke racial hatred,” Blanche said.

The civil rights group faces charges of wire fraud, bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering in the case brought in the federal court in Alabama, where the organization is based.

The indictment came shortly after the SPLC revealed the existence of a criminal investigation into its disbanded informant program to gather intelligence on extremist group activities. The group said the program was used to monitor threats of violence and the information was often shared with local and federal law enforcement.

The SPLC said it “will vigorously defend ourselves, our staff, and our work" against what it described as false allegations. The group said its informant program saved lives.

“Taking on violent hate and extremist groups is among the most dangerous work there is, and we believe it is also among the most important work we do,” interim CEO and president Bryan Fair said in a statement. “The actions by the DOJ will not shake our resolve to fight for justice and ensure the promise of the Civil Rights Movement becomes a reality for all."

The Justice Department alleges the SPLC made false statements to banks in order to set up accounts used to funnel money to informants. The group created bank accounts for fictitious entities such as “Fox Photography” and “Rare Books Warehouse” that were used to send money from donors to informants, in a scheme to conceal the money’s actual purpose, the indictment alleges.

Prosecutors say the group never disclosed to donors details of the informant program.

“They’re required to under the laws associated with a nonprofit to have certain transparency and honesty in what they’re telling donors they’re going to spend money on and what their mission statement is and what they’re raising money doing,” Blanche said.

The indictment includes details on at least nine unnamed informants were paid by the SPLC through a secret program that prosecutors say began in the 1980s. Within the SPLC, they were known as field sources or “the Fs,” according to the indictment.

One informant was paid more than $1 million between 2014 and 2023 while affiliated with the neo-Nazi National Alliance, the indictment said. Prosecutors say another informant was a member of the “online leadership chat group” that planned the 2017 white nationalist “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. The informant attended the rally at the direction of the SPLC, according to the indictment, and helped coordinate transportation for several others. That person was allegedly paid more than $270,000 between 2015 and 2023.

The SPLC said the program was kept quiet to protect the safety of informants.

“When we began working with informants, we were living in the shadow of the height of the Civil Rights Movement, which had seen bombings at churches, state-sponsored violence against demonstrators, and the murders of activists that went unanswered by the justice system,” Fair said. “There is no question that what we learned from informants saved lives.”

The SPLC, which is based in Montgomery, Alabama, was founded in 1971 and used civil litigation to fight white supremacist groups. The nonprofit has become a popular target among Republicans who see it as overly leftist and partisan.

The investigation could add to concerns that Trump's Republican administration is using the Justice Department to go after conservative opponents and his critics. It follows a number of other investigations into Trump foes that have raised questions about whether the law enforcement agency has been turned into a political weapon.

The SPLC has faced intense criticism from conservatives, who have accused it of unfairly maligning right-wing organizations as extremist groups because of their viewpoints. The center regularly condemns Trump’s rhetoric and policies around voting rights, immigration and other issues.

The center came under fresh scrutiny after the assassination last year of conservative activist Charlie Kirk brought renewed attention to its characterization of the group that Kirk founded and led. The center included a section on that group, Turning Point USA, in a report titled “The Year in Hate and Extremism 2024” that described the group as “A Case Study of the Hard Right in 2024.”

FBI Director Kash Patel said last year that the agency was severing its relationship with the center, which had long provided law enforcement with research on hate crime and domestic extremism. Patel said the center had been turned into a “partisan smear machine,” and he accused it of defaming “mainstream Americans” with its “hate map” that documents alleged anti-government and hate groups inside the United States.

Boone reported from Boise, Idaho.

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This story was first published April 21, 2026. It was updated April 24, 2026, to correct that an informant was allegedly paid more than $270,000 between 2015 and 2023, not between 2015 and 2013.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche speaks as FBI Director Kash Patel listens during a news conference at the Justice Department, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche listens during a news conference at the Justice Department, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

FBI Director Kash Patel speaks during a news conference at the Justice Department, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche speaks as FBI Director Kash Patel listens during a news conference at the Justice Department, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche speaks as FBI Director Kash Patel listens during a news conference at the Justice Department, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

FILE - Tourists walk past a banner with President Donald Trump hanging on the Department of Justice, Feb. 27, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul, File)

Adding more turmoil to a chaotic World Cup buildup for Iran, the national soccer federation claimed Tuesday that FIFA revoked the ticket allocation for fans at the team’s three group-stage games in the United States.

Each federation for the 48 teams taking part is entitled to receive and distribute 8% of stadium capacity for each of its games at the World Cup, adding up to several thousands of tickets per game.

Those allocations typically went on sale to each team's most loyal fans soon after the tournament draw in December, when Iranians had already for five months been subject to a travel ban by the U.S. government.

Now, just days before Iran opens its World Cup — on June 15 at the 70,000-seat Los Angeles Rams’ stadium in Inglewood against New Zealand — the federation claimed in a statement reported by semi-official state media it was now unable to provide any tickets to its supporters.

The claim adds to the tensions between Iranian soccer, FIFA and tournament co-host the U.S., which began military attacks on Iran on Feb. 28.

FIFA has total authority over ticketing operations at the World Cup, yet the Iranian soccer body suggested “the United States has now taken steps to obstruct the presence of Iranian supporters at the stadiums.”

“This incident raises serious questions about the influence of non-sporting and political considerations on the organization of the world’s biggest football event,” the Iranian soccer federation said.

FIFA said in a statement Tuesday it is "working closely with the IR Iran Football Federation to identify compliant solutions that maximize opportunities for Iranian supporters to attend matches.”

FIFA President Gianni Infantino and its CEO-like secretary general Mattias Grafström each promised logistical support in face-to-face meetings with Iranian soccer officials in Turkey in recent weeks.

Most of Iran's 26-man squad has not had a competitive game since February because they play for clubs in the domestic league that was shut down by the war.

They are now based in the Mexican border city of Tijuana instead of a pre-war plan to train in Tucson, Arizona. It is the team's seventh appearance at a men's World Cup.

Some federation officials also have been denied visas to enter the U.S., where Iran also plays Belgium in Inglewood, a suburb of Los Angeles, on June 21 and then Egypt in Seattle on June 26.

Andrew Giuliani, the executive director of the White House FIFA task force, said Tuesday that the Iranian team would be able to enter the U.S. the day before their match and emphasized that Tijuana was a short flight to Los Angeles. He confirmed that some Iranian officials were “not coming in” and while he declined to go into specifics, Giuliani added that “as you can imagine, there are some people that claim that they are coaches that may not be coaches.”

“The president has been clear on this one ... that he wants to make sure that they have every opportunity to compete on a level playing field here, while also making sure that people that are directly working, let’s say, with the IRGC have no ability to access the United States of America,” Giuliani said, referring to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Fans wanting to come to the U.S. to follow the team were likely to face issues obtaining visas issues and making payments while financial sanctions are in force.

“However, in an unexpected move, the allocation granted to Iran’s football federation has been withdrawn, and under the current circumstances the federation is unable to offer even a single ticket to national team supporters,” the federation said.

It was unclear Tuesday how many tickets in Iran’s allocation were sold, if they live in their home country or are part of its diaspora including about 1 million people in the U.S.

If Iranian tickets are revoked, FIFA would have just days to sell about 5,600 tickets for the Iran-New Zealand game on Monday, though Los Angeles has the largest Iranian community in the U.S.

The FIFA sales site on Tuesday showed rows of field-level seats available at $450 each though in the dozens rather than hundreds.

Still, Infantino stated in 2017 — when U.S. soccer officials were preparing a co-hosting bid with Canada and Mexico they won the following year — that fans must have access to the tournament.

“It’s obvious when it comes to FIFA competitions as well (that) any team, including the supporters and the officials of that team, who would qualify for a World Cup need to have access to the country, otherwise there is no World Cup,” Infantino said nine years ago. “That is obvious.”

U.S. policy toward World Cup visitors is becoming a strong theme before the games begin on Thursday.

A FIFA-appointed match referee from Somalia was denied entry to the U.S. in Miami at the weekend and on Monday he was cut from the 104-game tournament that starts in Mexico City.

An Iraq player was detained for several hours on arriving in Chicago and a photographer traveling with the delegation was denied entry.

“The disruption is such that one has to ask who is running the World Cup. Is it FIFA or is it the U.S. government with its racially charged immigration policies?” Piara Powar, the head of FIFA's anti-discrimination monitoring partner, said on Tuesday in a statement.

“Before a ball has been kicked,” said Powar, executive director of the Fare Network, “the sense that this World Cup is anything but the celebration of global humanity a World Cup should be is beginning to take over.”

Associated Press writer Seung Min Kim contributed to this report from Washington. AP World Cup: https://apnews.com/hub/fifa-world-cup

Iran's Ehsan Hajisafi arrives with his teammates for the World Cup soccer tournament in Tijuana, Mexico, Sunday, June 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)

Fans for team Iran wave as players arrive for the World Cup soccer tournament in Tijuana, Mexico, Sunday, June 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)