Prosecutors say SPLC routed $3 million in donor funds to KKK informants
Heidi Beirich, a former director at the Southern Poverty Law Center who once tracked hate groups for the SPLC, surrendered Wednesday in California to face a federal indictment on fraud charges, according to a person familiar with the matter.
A grand jury in Alabama, where the SPLC is based, indicted Beirich Tuesday on charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to submit false statements to a federally insured bank. A court in Alabama unsealed the charges the day after, and she was set to appear in a California federal court Wednesday.
“As alleged, I believe she was part of the effort to open bank accounts in completely fictitious companies’ names and make payments to individuals for reasons that were not accurate as described,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said Wednesday.
The case against Beirich is part of a broader federal prosecution the Trump administration brought against the SPLC earlier this year. Prosecutors have accused the civil-rights organization — built on courtroom victories against the Ku Klux Klan decades ago — of paying informants using bank accounts connected to fake companies.
Federal prosecutors say the scheme funneled at least $3 million in donor funds through those accounts between 2007 and 2023 to pay informants inside extremist groups, including the KKK. The grand jury indicted Beirich for her alleged role in concealing the source of those funds.
In court filings, the SPLC has argued that its now-defunct informant network helped it gather information on extremist groups. The SPLC and its lawyers did not immediately return requests for comment Wednesday.
She left the organization in 2019 after two decades tracking white-supremacy and far-right movements, according to her LinkedIn profile. She testified before Congress in 2020 on white supremacy in the military. The 59-year-old lives in Palm Springs, California.
If convicted, Beirich could face decades in federal prison. Fraud convictions could “sink the antiracism nonprofit,” according to reporting on the case.
The SPLC built its reputation fighting the Klan in court decades ago. Republicans have accused the SPLC of unfairly maligning Christian and conservative groups by labeling them as extremists. The Trump administration has described its effort as correcting what it calls the Biden administration’s anticonservative bias.