Defamation Lawsuit Against Southern Poverty Law Center Moves Forward

A defamation lawsuit against the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is proceeding after the SPLC referred to an immigration reform advocacy group as an “anti-immigrant hate group.”

The Dustin Inman Society (DIS), an organization aimed at “promoting the enforcement of immigration laws in the United States,” filed the lawsuit. They claim that the SPLC’s identification of their organization as a “hate group” is defamatory and puts them at risk of violent retaliation.

Judge William Keith Watkins of Alabama’s Middle District Federal Court denied the SPLC’s request to dismiss the lawsuit on March 31.

The SPLC is a nonprofit organization that specializes in civil rights litigation and advocacy. They also operate a website that tracks extremist activity in the United States, where they document their “extremist group” labels on a “Hate Map” web portal. The Hate Map includes anti-immigrant, anti-LGBTQ, anti-Muslim, Christian identity, general hate, hate music, KKK, male supremacy, Neo-Confederacy, Neo-Nazi, Neo-Völkisch, racist skinhead, radical traditional Catholicism, and white nationalism.

The DIS says the SPLC reversed an earlier decision, in which the SPLC stated that the DIS did not belong on the “Hate Map,” because the DIS was handling immigration policy objectives through the legal process, rather than threats of violence or intimidation of immigrants. The SPLC then added the “anti-immigrant hate group” label in February of 2018, despite no change in the criteria for labeling organizations as hate groups or the DIS’s behaviors.

The SPLC’s change in tune, according to the DIS, came after the SPLC registered lobbyists in Georgia opposed to a “pro-enforcement” immigration bill working through the state legislature.

D.A. King, the founder and president of the DIS, believes that the SPLC’s efforts to label them as an extremist group were an attempt to marginalize them in the eyes of state lawmakers and the media.

Threats of Violence

According to the DIS, other individuals and organizations, such as the Family Resource Council and Dr. Charles Murray, have faced violent threats after being labeled hate groups by the SPLC.

The DIS’s federal lawsuit against the SPLC remains live because Judge William Keith Watkins denied the SPLC’s motion to have the suit dismissed. The lawsuit alleges that the SPLC’s labeling as a hate group is particularly harmful since the organization has a reputation as a reputable source of information on extremist activity. The mainstream media routinely cites the SPLC in their reporting on hate groups and extremism in the United States.

NTD News sought a comment from the SPLC but did not receive a response at the time of writing.