FBI Ends Association with Southern Poverty Law Center  

But Liberty Counsel Continues to Battle the SPLC in Court 

 On April 1, 2025, we won a decisive victory in the long-running frivolous litigation involving the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) in the Lisa Miller case. But the SPLC is not yet giving up in its quest to “destroy” Liberty Counsel. The SPLC filed an appeal, and its Opening Brief is due soon. 

In the meantime, FBI Director Kash Patel took to social media recently to brand the SPLC as a “partisan smear machine.” The move comes as the FBI and government agencies formally end and renounce any association with the viciously dangerous organization. 

For years, the SPLC has published a “hate map,” falsely labeling Christian and family groups such as Moms for Liberty, Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA, Focus on the Family’s Family Research Council, immigration reform groups like our client, the Dustin Inman Society, and even Liberty Counsel as “hate groups.” 

The FBI’s association with the SPLC may be over, but Liberty Counsel is still battling the SPLC in two major court cases. 

Defeat the SPLC by supporting our legal fund today! Every donation will be DOUBLED in impact by a special Challenge Grant.

FBI Director Patel wrote that the SPLC’s “so-called ‘hate map’ has been used to defame mainstream Americans and even inspired violence.” 

Patel was referring to shootings in 2012 and 2017, connected to the SPLC. 

In 2012, radicalized Floyd Corkins tried to mass-murder the employees of Family Research Council (FRC). Corkins told police he chose FRC because they are on the SPLC’s “hate list.” Corkins had a hit list of others to kill that the SPLC also listed on its “hate map.” 

In 2017, James Hodgkinson shot Republicans at the Congressional baseball game. Police found that he was a follower of the SPLC on social media and that the SPLC falsely wrote about Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA), who was seriously injured that day. 

In 2025, the SPLC put Turning Point USA on its hate list. 

"Their game plan?” wrote Charlie Kirk on social media at the time, “Scare financial institutions into debanking us, pressure schools to cancel us, and demonize us so some unhinged lunatic feels justified targeting us." 

"Remember the Family Research Council?” Charlie continued. “An SPLC-inspired gunman went after them. They’d love nothing more than to see TPUSA in the crosshairs.” 

Less than four months after the SPLC put Turning Point USA on its hate list, yet another radical leftist put Charlie in the literal crosshairs, killing the Christian conservative leader.

Defeat the SPLC!

The SPLC put Liberty Counsel on its hate list in 2011. Since that time, we have faced innumerable, credible death threats. We’ve had to beef up security for our offices and around our employees.

Then they tried to bankrupt us with lawfare. For years, the SPLC has pursued a stunningly frivolous lawsuit against us, claiming without a shred of evidence that we helped kidnap a child. In addition to the outrageous unfounded accusation, the SPLC’s client, Janet Jenkins, demanded a 200-billion-dollar judgment against us. 

We spent over a decade and more than 11,000 hours defending against the SPLC’s frivolous lawsuit, which falsely accused Liberty Counsel of participating in a conspiracy to help our former client, Lisa Miller, flee the country with her biological child. SPLC KNEW the client lied. ALL the evidence PROVED we were innocent. 

Yet the SPLC pursued the case anyway, hoping to bury us under the same expensive legal mountain with which they have bankrupted others.

In addition, we are defending the Dustin Inman Society against the SPLC’s “hate list” accusations. Named for a young teen boy killed by an illegal immigrant, the Society works toward commonsense immigration reform. But the SPLC labeled this peaceful organization as a “hate group” in 2018.

The FBI may have ended its association with the SPLC, but our cases must still be fought in court. We need your help to defeat these hatemongers once and for all.

Please support our legal fund with a generous gift, or even a monthly recurring monthly gift today. Every donation made today will be DOUBLED in impact by a special Challenge Grant.

“The LORD will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways” (Deut. 28:7).

Mat Staver
Founder and Chairman
Liberty Counsel