Attorney General Todd Blanche describes the SPLC’s methods as creating the very extremism they claim to be fighting, by paying sources to stir up racial hatred.
A former financial officer at the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) was indicted on Wednesday over her central role in a scheme in which the organisation secretly paid informants to infiltrate groups promoting white supremacy.
Heidi Beirich of Palm Springs, California, appeared for the first time in a federal court in Riverside on Wednesday. CNN reported that she had been arrested earlier that day, the New York Post writes.
Attorney General Todd Blanche confirmed at a press conference, in another context, that a new indictment has been filed which includes the former financial officer of the SPLC.
Beirich’s lawyer rejects the allegations. – Dr Beirich is innocent, and this case is baseless, a press release from the lawyer states.
The defence counsel believes that the allegations against Beirich and the SPLC are politically motivated, and that she has been subjected to this because of the work she has done to combat hate groups and extremists.
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) August 12, 2026
The FBI accuses the SPLC of deliberately misleading donors who believed that their money would be used to combat violent extremist organisations. According to Patel, parts of the donations were instead used to pay leading members of these groups.
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is an American anti-racist non-profit organisation that works on civil rights and conducts public-interest litigation.
The organisation is headquartered in Montgomery, Alabama, and is particularly known for litigation against groups promoting white supremacy, and for classifying organisations as ‘hate groups’ and other extremist organisations.
The SPLC was founded in 1971 by Morris Dees, Joseph J. Levin Jr and Julian Bond.
Since its founding, the SPLC has been accused of having a strong political bias.
A well-known example dates from 2014, when the organisation placed Ben Carson on its list of extremists, partly because of his association with groups the SPLC considered extreme, and because he had linked homosexuality to paedophilia.
Following criticism, the SPLC removed Carson from the list in February 2015 and apologised to the well-known neurosurgeon, who is black.
In an earlier indictment, dated 2 June, the person who would later become director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project is referred to as ‘Employee-2’. Beirich held this position from 2012 to 2019.
In 2014, Beirich paid an informant, referred to as F-9, to break into the National Alliance’s headquarters and steal 25 boxes of documents. The material was later to be used for an article on the SPLC’s Hatewatch blog entitled Chaos at the Compound.
Over a period of 20 years, F-9 received more than $1.2 million from SPLC donor funds.
Another report from the SPLC’s Intelligence Project from 2015 is also still available on the website. In the 52-page report, one of the chapters is devoted to Donald Trump and what is described as his remarkable support among racist white nationalists.
The report was published only a few months after Trump announced his candidacy for president. At the time, Heidi Beirich was director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project, which produced the report.
Another informant, F-39, received $6,000 in donor funds to take ‘false responsibility’ for the break-in, according to the indictment. The New York Post has previously identified F-39 as Randolph Dilloway, a former member of the National Alliance. Dilloway is an almost deaf accountant who had previously been a member of several other hate groups before joining the neo-Nazi organisation.
[https://www.document.no/2026/04/22/anti-rasistene-i-splc-betalte-store-summer-til-rasister-for-a-vise-sin-berettigelse/]
She is the first SPLC employee to be named as a participant in a conspiracy which, according to prosecutors, involves wire fraud, bank fraud and money laundering.
National Alliance chairman William White Williams, 78, has previously confirmed to The Post that Beirich was the person referred to in the indictment. – I knew it was that fat, ugly pig Heidi Beirich, Williams told the newspaper from his home in eastern Tennessee.
At the same time, he speculated as to why the informants had agreed to cooperate with the SPLC.
– I think some of these ‘chickens’ wanted to get out of the movement and approached the SPLC for help. But instead of helping them, [the SPLC] said: ‘Why don’t you stay involved and get paid?’
In 2020, Beirich was the Democrats’ principal witness in the House of Representatives hearing on ‘white supremacy in the military’.
According to the indictment, some of the money was used to cover the costs of wood and fuel to be used during cross-burnings. Other funds are alleged to have gone towards the production and publication of racist pamphlets and extremist literature, as well as other work to maintain the SPLC’s network of informants.
Attorney General Todd Blanche has previously described the SPLC’s methods as creating the very extremism they claim to be fighting, by paying sources to stir up racial hatred.
Beirich’s defence counsel denies that she has done anything wrong.
– A free and fair society does not use the justice system to silence its political opponents, defence counsel Proctor said. – Heidi Beirich has devoted her life to combating hate groups and extremist movements such as the KKK, neo-Nazis and other white supremacists.