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Ever wonder why slapping a “hate group” label on folks feels like it should cost pocket change, not nine figures?
You’re not alone.
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) rakes in boatloads of cash every year while churning out those infamous lists that critics call little more than a conservative blacklist.
But what happens to all that dough? Spoiler: it piles up like cordwood in an Alabama barn, fueling gripes that the SPLC is more nonprofit mogul than poverty fighter.
Their latest IRS Form 990 tells the story.
In fiscal year 2023, the SPLC pulled in a cool $129 million in total revenue—$106 million of that from donors convinced they were battling the bogeyman. Fundraising alone consumed $17.4 million, roughly equivalent to the budgets of some small towns.
And the crown jewel?
Their endowment ballooned to $731.9 million by year’s end—bigger than some Ivy League schools’ rainy-day funds. That’s money “set aside for the future,” they say. Skeptics snort: “Future like what, a gold-plated hate map?”
And let’s talk about those maps.
The SPLC claims to track “hate” across America, but its so-called research has glaring blind spots. Noticeably absent are Antifa and Black Lives Matter—groups that, by any honest measure, left their mark in blood and ashes.
As author Tyler O’Neil has noted: “Antifa agitators have engaged in violence for years, most notably in the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020. The riots that grew out of those protests caused an estimated $2 billion in damages, measured by insurance payouts, and took the lives of 26 Americans—tragically including black people.” Yet the SPLC somehow finds suburban church groups more deserving of a red dot on their map than the mobs that torched cities.
Meanwhile, the spending habits raise eyebrows.
In 2011, they raised $36 million but only spent $11 million on actual legal aid. IRS filings show $30 million stashed in the Cayman Islands and another $3 million pocketed from Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi fallout.
Charity watchdogs have repeatedly criticized them for opacity. Ex-staffer Bob Moser flatly called the place “a highly profitable scam where fear sells.”
And here’s where it turns dark.
The SPLC claims its work protects Americans from “hate.” But what about the hate aimed squarely at conservatives?
Just months ago, in May 2025, Charlie Kirk—the young leader of Turning Point USA—was assassinated.
That wasn’t a theoretical red dot on a map. That was a bullet in the head of one of the most influential conservative voices in America. The SPLC’s lists have helped paint targets on the backs of people like Kirk, while the violent agitators of the Left go unmentioned.
Even progressives are starting to cringe at the irony: a group named for poverty law sitting on Harvard-level cash while firing off doomsday mailers.
“The S.P.L.C.—making hate pay,” staffers used to joke. It’s hard not to agree.
In the end, it’s not about fighting hate. It’s about funding an empire. Cash rules everything around the SPLC—and as long as they can keep donors in fear, the money will keep rolling in.
Alexis “Alex” Littlefield is Chief of Staff for Christian Action Network. With a PhD in International Politics, he has coordinated high-profile events with congressional staff and administration officials, including assistant secretaries and agency heads.
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