{"id":2593834,"date":"2026-04-22T15:01:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T19:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/fbi-does-it-too-media-hacks-go-all-out-to-downplay-splc-indictment\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T15:06:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T19:06:27","slug":"fbi-does-it-too-media-hacks-go-all-out-to-downplay-splc-indictment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/fbi-does-it-too-media-hacks-go-all-out-to-downplay-splc-indictment\/","title":{"rendered":"Media Hacks Go All Out To Downplay SPLC Indictment"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ffbi-does-it-too-media-hacks-go-all-out-to-downplay-splc-indictment%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2593834&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The article asserts that the Justice Department has charged the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) with wire fraud and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/sidney-powell-is-an-american-legal-giant\/\" title=\"Sidney Powell Is an American Legal Giant\">making false statements<\/a>, alleging that sence the 1980s the SPLC operated a covert network of individuals who funded and supported racist and extremist groups, including the Ku Klux Klan. it claims the SPLC told donors one thing while some of thier money allegedly funded leaders and organizers of racist groups, and it quotes the DOJ\u2019s description of the scheme as a way the SPLC \u201cmanufactured racism to justify its existence.\u201d The piece argues that several mainstream outlets minimized or obfuscated the indictment, painting the SPLC as a legitimate nonprofit rather than addressing the alleged financial crimes and ties to extremist groups. Examples cited include USA Today, The New York Times, and CBS News, with critics pointing to headlines and framing that sidestep the bombshell details.The article also highlights claims from the Media Research Center about omissions in coverage and notes that major news aggregators reportedly did not prominently feature the indictment. It concludes with background on the author, Shawn Fleetwood, a Federalist staff writer.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The Justice Department just announced major charges against one of the left&rsquo;s most dishonest and radical smear organizations. But you wouldn&rsquo;t know it by reading and watching legacy media. <\/p>\n<p>Following Tuesday&rsquo;s <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/04\/21\/grand-jury-indicts-southern-poverty-law-center-for-secret-fraudulent-payments-to-racist-groups\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">indictment<\/a> against the <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/southern-poverty-law-center\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Southern Poverty Law Center <\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/splc\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">(SPLC)<\/a> &mdash; which allegedly distributed more than $3 million in fraudulent payments to racist groups like the KKK from 2014 to 2023 &mdash; the so-called &ldquo;defenders of democracy&rdquo; in America&rsquo;s corporate press have gotten to work. Not by honestly reporting on the bombshell charges, but by running interference for their far-left ally &mdash; one who has <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/04\/21\/report-doj-investigating-southern-poverty-law-center-for-use-of-paid-informants\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">vilified<\/a> conservative organizations by classifying them as &ldquo;hate groups&rdquo; alongside actual extremist groups.<\/p>\n<p>For context, the DOJ <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/opa\/pr\/federal-grand-jury-charges-southern-poverty-law-center-wire-fraud-false-statements-and\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">said<\/a> that the federal indictment returned by the Alabama-based grand jury detailed how the SPLC allegedly began a &ldquo;covert network&rdquo; in the 1980s comprised of individuals &ldquo;who were either associated with violent and extremist groups &hellip; or who had <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/grand-jury-indicts-southern-poverty-law-center-for-secret-fraudulent-payments-to-racist-groups\/\" title=\"Jury Indicts ... For Fraudulent Payments To ...\">infiltrated violent extremist groups<\/a> at the SPLC&rsquo;s direction.&rdquo; The SPLC, however, purportedly declined to inform its donors that &ldquo;some of their donated money was being used to fund the leaders and organizers of racist groups at the same time that the SPLC was denouncing the same groups on its website.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche summed up the case perfectly by saying, &ldquo;The SPLC is manufacturing racism to justify its existence.&rdquo; <\/p>\n<p>If Americans were to consume USA Today&rsquo;s summation of this scandal, however, they&rsquo;d likely come away with the conclusion that these alleged tactics are no big deal. The left-wing outlet ran an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/nation\/2026\/04\/22\/splc-indicted-paying-sources-fbi-pays-informants\/89726011007\/?taid=69e8aef47728b40001f5a5f5&amp;utm_campaign=trueanthem&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">article<\/a> by national correspondent Will Carless titled &ldquo;Key civil rights group indicted for paying informants. But FBI does it too,&rdquo; which effectively downplayed the DOJ indictment by comparing the SPLC&rsquo;s alleged actions to those embraced by federal agents.<\/p>\n<figure>\n<p><span><\/p>\n<blockquote data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<div lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\n<p>There is a pending community note on this, but it is infuriating that a huge newspaper will just flat-out lie about the news<\/p>\n<p>SPLC was not &#8220;indicted for paying sources&#8221;. They were indicted for wire fraud and making false statements. Just tell us the truth! It&#8217;s not that hard! <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/ElkPzSEKKB\">https:\/\/t.co\/ElkPzSEKKB<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&mdash; PoIiMath (@politicalmath) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/politicalmath\/status\/2046955918605144229?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 22, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><\/span> <\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>As one might imagine, USA Today was hardly the only &ldquo;news&rdquo; outlet to pull this type of chicanery. <\/p>\n<p>The New York Times ran the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/04\/21\/us\/politics\/southern-poverty-law-center-doj-investigation.html?smtyp=cur&amp;smid=tw-nytimes\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">headline<\/a> &ldquo;Justice Dept. Charges Prominent Civil Rights Group With Financial Crimes,&rdquo; which conveniently omits the bombshell detail about the SPLC&rsquo;s alleged siphoning of millions of dollars into actual extremist groups. While such information is included in the article, Times reporter Devlin Barrett seemingly did his best to run cover for the SPLC by framing criticisms of its role vilifying conservative groups as another example of &ldquo;Republicans pounce!&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The Southern Poverty Law Center was formed in 1971 in Alabama and is best known for investigating groups like the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacy organizations. In recent years, Republicans have accused the group of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/fbi-disavows-internal-memo-warning-against-radical-traditionalist-catholic-ideology\/\" title=\"FBI Disavows Internal Memo Warning Against \u201cRadical Traditionalist Catholic Ideology...\">unfairly targeting conservative<\/a> and Christian organizations, labeling them as extremists,&rdquo; Barrett wrote.<\/p>\n<figure><\/figure>\n<p><strong>[READ:[READ:<a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/04\/22\/flashback-indicted-splc-once-targeted-the-federalist-for-publishing-an-attorney-generals-speech\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Flashback: Indicted SPLC Once Targeted The Federalist For Publishing An Attorney General&rsquo;s Speech<\/a>]<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>CBS News&rsquo; Sarah Lynch and Jacob Rosen similarly obfuscated the SPLC&rsquo;s role as a left-wing smear machine.<\/p>\n<p>In their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/southern-poverty-law-center-justice-department-investigation-informants-hate-groups\/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab7e&amp;linkId=931427502\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">write-up<\/a> of the charges, they characterized the far-left group as just a good ole &ldquo;nonprofit&rdquo; whose work includes &ldquo;track[ing] white supremacist and other hate groups across the U.S.,&rdquo; and that is &ldquo;best known for &hellip; investigating the Ku Klux Klan.&rdquo; The two writers seemingly tried to make it appear as if Republicans are sympathetic to such extremist groups by not-so-subtly including a vague description of their SPLC criticisms in the same paragraph.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The SPLC is a nonprofit that tracks white supremacist and other hate groups across the U.S., and has been a frequent target of President Trump&rsquo;s allies. It is best known for its work investigating the Ku Klux Klan,&rdquo; Lynch and Rosen wrote. <\/p>\n<p>Only after trudging through 10 additional paragraphs are readers given more context about the Trump administration and conservatives&rsquo; criticisms and the SPLC&rsquo;s smears. <\/p>\n<figure>\n<p><span><\/p>\n<blockquote data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<div lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\n<p>Did you have the SPLC write this? Serious question: <\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The SPLC is a nonprofit that tracks white supremacist and other hate groups across the U.S., and has been a frequent target of President Trump&#8217;s allies. It is best known for its work investigating the Ku Klux Klan.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&mdash; Mollie (@MZHemingway) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MZHemingway\/status\/2046909963243590106?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 22, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><\/span> <\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>The media&rsquo;s bid to whitewash the DOJ&rsquo;s indictment has also included efforts to ignore the explosive story altogether. In other words, to lie by omission. <\/p>\n<p>The Media Research Center <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsbusters.org\/blogs\/nb\/jorge-bonilla\/2026\/04\/21\/omission-networks-fall-silent-indictment-splc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reported<\/a> late Tuesday night how many <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\" >major networks didn&#038;rsquo<\/a>;t bother informing their viewers about the charges brought against the SPLC.<\/p>\n<p>The MRC&rsquo;s Free Speech America separately <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/FreeSpeechAmer\/status\/2047004555569721479?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reported<\/a> that major news-aggregation sites like Google, MSN, and Yahoo &ldquo;ran other crime-related stories, including CNN smearing Kash Patel,&rdquo; in light of the SPLC indictment. It additionally <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/FreeSpeechAmer\/status\/2046991019510489481?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reported<\/a> that, &ldquo;Google News did not run a single story [Wednesday] morning in its top 20 about the SPLC being indicted,&rdquo; and &ldquo;instead it promoted &hellip; NPR stories about a naked mole rat colony and a golden helmet.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<figure>\n<p><span><\/p>\n<blockquote data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<div lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\n<p>SPLC is a domestic terrorist organization that issued a fatwa against Charlie Kirk and Turning Point USA earlier this year. They put a target on Charlie&rsquo;s back and all but called for his assassination.<\/p>\n<p>SPLC scheming also previously incited a mass shooting attempt on the Family&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/pT9lu3uKbA\">pic.twitter.com\/pT9lu3uKbA<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&mdash; Sean Davis (@seanmdav) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/seanmdav\/status\/1966169027036021060?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 11, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><\/span> <\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<hr>\n<p>      Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. His work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics and RealClearHealth. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>DOJ charges SPLC; media silent on the case<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":539,"featured_media":2593835,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Kash-Patel.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546,33651],"tags":[15074,5157,4188,15303],"class_list":["post-2593834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist","category-the-western-journal","tag-indictment","tag-journalism","tag-media","tag-splc"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Kash-Patel.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2593834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/539"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2593834"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2593834\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2593842,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2593834\/revisions\/2593842"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2593835"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2593834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2593834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2593834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}