southern poverty law center

Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC, Mark Potok, Morris Dees, Heidi Beirich): Page 2


See the summary for this topic on the main Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC, Mark Potok, Morris Dees, Heidi Beirich) page.

Discussed in (click each link for the full post):

Carrie Johnson /WaPo smears opponents of Obama, immigration (rise in "hate", SPLC) - 01/11/09

Carrie Johnson of the Washington Post offers "Bad Economy May Fuel Hate Groups, Experts Warn/Experts Warn That Downturn Could Drive Discontent, Help Extremists Recruit" (link), which is basically the same article as that offered by Jesse Washington of the AP and others back in November, albeit updated for the current economic conditions. She starts out with the possibility that Obama's win, immigration, and the slumping economy could lead to rising membership in "hate" groups. Aside from the "experts" quoted, she provides no evidence in support of her assertion, and at the end she provides...

Rights Working Group wants immigration enforcement moratorium and much more (ACLU, NCLR, 248 others) - 01/09/09

The Asian American Justice Center runs the Rights Working Group, a coalition of over 250 leftwing groups, and they have a petition calling on Barack Obama to in effect not do immigration enforcement. They want a "moratorium" while the subject of raids and the like is "studied", but everyone knows what that means.

Jesse Washington/AP's supposed "outbreak of racial anger" after Obama win - 11/16/08

Jesse Washington of the Associate Press provides another example of Obama supporters continuing to play the race card after the election and by so doing shows that Obama's method of winning hasn't actually done much about race relations. The article is an example of the MSM and friends basically just keeping one race in line as was done in the past with another race (link). Crosses burning. Children chanting, "Assassinate Obama." Racial epithets scrawled on homes and cars. Yes, there definitely has been an outbreak of isolated incidents involving those who have no real power. Washington can...

Mexico linked groups complain about "hate group" FAIR (FIRM, SEIU, America's Voice, NCLR) - 09/11/08

The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is currently conducting the "Hold Their Feet to the Fire" rally in Washington DC where radio hosts from across the country and their listeners lobby their representatives to support pro-borders causes. Needless to say, the other side doesn't like that too much, and four such groups have joined together to place a scurrilous advertisement in the Politico and Roll Call. You can see the ad linked from seiu.org/media/pressreleases.cfm?pr_id=1753, which says: Today the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), America's Voice, Center for...

Ask John McCain about the impacts of amnesty ("comprehensive immigration reform") - 08/30/08

Here's a question you're urged to ask John McCain at one of his public events. Make sure and videotape the question and the answer, and then upload it to Youtube and other sites. If anyone asks this I can provide follow-ups, and of course feel free to adapt it to your speaking style or remove parts of the first paragraph as necessary: Senator McCain: the immigration "reform" you support will give a great deal of political power to groups on the far-left (ACLU, SPLC), racial power groups (NCLR, LULAC, MALDEF), the Democrats, the Mexican government, and others.

SPLC misleads about American Legion immigration report - 08/20/08

The American Legion has released a booklet called "A Strategy to Address Illegal Immigration in the United States" [1]. I haven't read it, but Sonia Scherr of the Southern Poverty Law Center apparently has and offers "American Legion Immigration Report Replete With Falsehoods" [2]. Based only on what she says, it appears the the AL made a few mistakes and left themselves open to groups like the SPLC - which is indirectly linked to the Mexican government - raising issues. They should have foreseen that would happen and subjected it to stringent review; that might be happening now [1]. That...

Judy Bachrach/Vanity Fair smears Lou Dobbs - 08/08/08

Freelance writer and Vanity Fair contributor Judy Bachrach offers a smear of Lou Dobbs in "Lou Doubts" (poder360.com/article_detail.php?id_article=549). It's yet another example of the illegal activity-supporting establishment trying to reduce his influence in order to profit from illegal activity in one way or another.

Parents: watch for Southern Poverty Law Center's Cesar Chavez "documentary" - 07/12/08

The Southern Poverty Law Center (also see this) - a group indirectly linked to the Mexican government - is producing a "documentary" on Cesar Chavez which they'll be distributing free to schools across the U.S. starting in September (splcenter.org/news/item.jsp?aid=318, via this).

Senator Bob Menendez uses alleged ICE abuses to hamper immigration enforcement (SPLC, NYT) - 06/16/08

Senator Robert Menendez is a racial demagogue who supports massive Hispanic immigration (of any kind) in order to obtain political power. His latest trick to oppose immigration enforcement was a speech he gave on the Senate floor last week [1] in which he made several inflammatory statements about the government he supposedly works for and highlighted rare examples of abuses - some merely alleged - by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). He also promised legislation concerning this issue. You can view the speech here and here. From the inflammatory side of things, he refers to agents...

Brave: Bob Barr denounces two on extreme fringe - 06/02/08

Showing intense, heroic bravery, Libertarian Party candidate Bob Barr has denounced two white nationalists who endorsed him, including one who is just a commenter on a message board (reason.com/blog/show/126790.html). Barr's campaign manager says: The Barr campaign is not going to be a vehicle for every fringe and hate group to promote itself. We do not want and will not accept the support of haters.

Barack Obama lies, falsely accuses Dobbs, Limbaugh of inciting hate crimes - 05/23/08

At a Florida fundraiser yesterday, Barack Obama said this: "A certain segment has basically been feeding a kind of xenophobia. There's a reason why hate crimes against Hispanic people doubled last year... If you have people like Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh ginning things up, it's not surprising that would happen." Those statements are beyond reprehensible, and come close to accusing Dobbs and Limbaugh of breaking the law. And, the reason he did it is because he's completely corrupt, hoping to obtain political power by supporting illegal immigration. Rather than supporting our laws as a U.S...

Former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack takes illegal immigration side in Swift raid; Peter Schey link - 04/29/08

From this: Allegations that federal officials illegally rounded up and arrested almost 1,300 Swift factory workers during raids in Marshalltown and across the country are being highlighted today at a public hearing that includes testimony from former Gov. Tom Vilsack...

Ripping up flags is no way to fight illegal immigration (UNM case) - 04/06/08

Let's say you're a student at the University of New Mexico and an Air Force veteran and you spot a lone Mexican flag flying on a UNM flag pole. You complain to administrators about it for a few days but they give you the run around. What do you do? 1.

SPLC's "The Year in Hate" misled about FBI hate crime statistics - 03/31/08

Earlier this month the Southern Poverty Law Center - a group indirectly linked to the Mexican government - released a report entitled "The Year in Hate", which continued their attempt to shut down debate about immigration matters. Per the AP:

MALDEF: Truth in Immigration website - 03/21/08

The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), has launched a new website called "Truth in Immigration" (truthinimmigration.org). Per this: John Trasvina, president of Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said Thursday the airwaves are dominated by anti-immigrant sentiment.

We Can Stop The Hate: Mexico-linked groups try silencing opponents of illegal immigration - 01/31/08

The extremist-funding National Council of La Raza has started a new effort called We Can Stop The Hate (wecanstopthehate.org) which is attempting to silence those who support our immigration laws by highlighting what they call examples of "hate". Three of their cohorts in the effort have at least indirect links to the Mexican government. Note that that government has explicitly stated that they're going to be using U.S.

Andres Oppenheimer's five "myths" of the "anti-immigration movement" - 01/14/08

Andres Oppenheimer of the Miami Herald - previously featured here for warning about a "Latino Intifada" unless we give millions of illegal aliens an amnesty - now offers "Five myths of anti-immigration talk", such as: Myth No. 1: ''We are only against illegal immigration. Undocumented immigrants should get in line for visas.'' That's deceptive because you can't demand that people get into line when, for the most part, there is no line to get into... While the U.S. labor market is demanding 1.5 million mostly low-skilled immigrants a year -- and will demand many more in coming years, as the U....

SPLC tries to stifle FAIR (Mexico links, CAP) - 12/11/07

Heidi Beirich of the Southern Poverty Law Center offers "The Teflon Nativists/FAIR Marked by Ties to White Supremacy" (splcenter . org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=846) with the news that it's "official": the SPLC has declared the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) to be a "hate group". They mention how much press coverage FAIR has received, and they include a quote from Henry Fernandez of the Center for American Progress which helps show that their goal is to stifle FAIR: "The sad fact is that attempts to reform our immigration system are being sabotaged by organizations...

Felipe Calderon explicitly wants Mexican consuls to meddle in U.S. immigration debate (non-profits) - 12/07/07

The only thing shocking about this is that he'd openly admit it: [Today, Mexican president Felipe Calderon] asked his diplomatic representatives in the U.S. to participate in the public debate on immigration by appearing at public events, talking more to the media and working with nonprofit groups to promote Mexican immigrants' role in supporting the U.S. economy. "The key is to neutralize this strategy of confrontation and discrimination that forms part of U.S. society's mistaken perception, and be able to newly focus arguments on the complimentary aspects of our economies," he said [to...

James Pinkerton, Mark Potok, Doris Meissner oppose citizen action against illegal immigration - 11/05/07

James Pinkerton of the Houston Chronicle offers "Taking border battle to the streets" about a local group (U.S. Border Watch) that protests in front of day laborer sites. While it's not as bad as other similar articles, he takes his lead from LBJ: he doesn't call them racists, he just makes them deny it. [see the update] Far from the halls of Congress and the front lines of the Southwest border, the divisive immigration debate is being played out in local neighborhoods, including the Houston area. A number of groups have upped the ante by moving from debate to confrontation, attempting to...

The ADL's definition of "hate" and "anti-immigrant" can't be trusted. (ALIPAC, others) - 10/31/07

The Anti-Defamation League - which apparently at one time did some good, but which is now a far-left Gramscian enforcer and defender of illegal activity - has released a new report entitled "Immigrants Targeted: Extremist Rhetoric Moves into the Mainstream" [1]: A closer look at the public record reveals that many ostensibly mainstream anti-illegal immigration organizations – including those who testified before Congress or frequently appeared on news programs – promote virulent anti-Hispanic and anti-immigrant rhetoric. Some groups have fostered links with extremist groups. They list...

Morris Dees/SPLC: Lou Dobbs will one day be "depicted like George Wallace" (Don Walton) - 10/23/07

Don Walton of Lincoln, Nebraska's Journal Star offers a gushing report of a stop by Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (link). We're informed that he's "increasingly focused now on Latino immigrant worker rights". Of course, what he really wants to do is give foreign citizens additional rights.

Center for American Progress' indirect Mexican government link (Henry Fernandez, Kica Matos) - 10/13/07

Henry Fernandez, Senior Fellow at the Clinton-linked Center for American Progress, is hosting a CAP event entitled "Strange Bed Fellows? Anti-immigration Organizations and Hate Groups" on October 18 [1]. The panelists are Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center (a group indirectly linked to the Mexican government) and Devin Burghart from the Center for New Community. Luckily, I scrolled down to the bottom of the page and I saw this: Fernandez lives with his wife Kica Matos and their son in New Haven, Connecticut. Matos is the former head of Junta for Progressive Action, a group that's...

Peter Prengaman, Travis Loller spin "reconquista" - 09/07/07

Peter Prengaman and Travis Loller of the Associated Press offer "Anti-Immigration Forces Warn of Plot" (original AP title). It discusses those that favor some form of "reconquista" and those who oppose them and tries to downplay the influence that those favoring "reconquista" have. On the other hand, it's good to see the AP at least acknowledging that such sentiments exist and publicizing them.

Rachel Uranga/Daily News on "anti-illegal immigrant groups" - 09/02/07

Ethnic booster/"reporter" Rachel Uranga of the Los Angeles Daily News offers (dailybulletin . com/beyondborders/ci_4177151) "Ranks of anti-illegal immigrant groups swelling". The title tells you most you need to know: while some of those groups may be "anti-illegal immigrant", others may actually be anti-illegal immigration and have no particular animus towards most of the illegal aliens themselves.

Book: "Domestic Enemies: The Reconquista" - 07/17/07

From the SPLC* Review of Books comes news of a book called "Domestic Enemies: The Reconquista": Now, courtesy of former Navy SEAL Matthew Bracken, comes the American version [of Camp of the Saints] - a portrait of the apocalypse Bracken fears will overtake America thanks to undocumented immigration from the south.

Mahalo.com: Hawaiian for "propaganda" - 06/02/07

mahalo.com is a new "search engine" from Jason Calacanis, formerly head of Weblogs, Inc. It's actually more like a cross between Wikipedia, dmoz.org, about.com, and Squidoo, or something like that. Rather than trying to answer all requests, they're only concentrating on the top 10,000 searches, and then providing pages that supposedly will provide a guide to that topic. Each page is written by a paid "guide".

David Leonhardt/New York Times: illegal immigration supporting hack - 05/30/07

David Leonhardt of the New York Times offers the much-linked "Truth, Fiction and Lou Dobbs". It discusses a few facts that Dobbs has gotten wrong, and to that extent it's worthwhile: everybody needs a fact-checker to keep them honest. However, one wonders about this bit: He is the heir to the nativist tradition that has long used fiction and conspiracy theories as a weapon against the Irish, the Italians, the Chinese, the Jews and, now, the Mexicans. That kind of smear doesn't sound like fact-checking to me. According to Lesley Stahl, journalists shouldn't mix in opinion with their facts....

Amanda Marcotte can't even get smears straight (Lou Dobbs, SPLC) - 05/23/07

John Edwards' former blogging star, Amanda Marcotte, offers [1] "Lou Dobbs really, really hates Mexicans": David Neiwert has a follow-up on the issue of Lou Dobbs trotting out numbers on national TV about Mexican nationals spreading leprosy that he got from a white supremacist group that pulled the numbers out of their asses. It's fucking disturbed that this man has a national microphone to promote racism like this. And his nastiness is getting nastier. Actually, there are two smears involved here, and she's confusing them. The "white supremacist group" is the CCC, and Dobbs did use a...

Leftwing illegal immigration supporters still after Lou Dobbs (SPLC) - 05/16/07

As the immigration "debate" picks up, various leftwing sources are trying to smack down Lou Dobbs in what may be an effort to counteract his opposition to any "reform" or what may be just a general attempt to support illegal immigration. There was, of course, the recent Lesley Stahl/60 Minutes lame hit piece.

100+ Hispanic groups send letter supporting illegal immigration, opposing raids - 05/08/07

The National Council of La Raza ("The Race") has led the charge to send a letter to president Bush (cc'ed to Michael Chertoff and Julie Myers) complaining about the recent workplace raids [1]. The list of "grassroots" organizations involved is in the extended entry, and some are "interesting": CASA of Maryland, Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials (one of whose founders marched alongside a former Mexican consul general in an illegal immigration march), the odious Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (their president is linked to...

Lesley Stahl/60 Minutes tries lame hit piece on Lou Dobbs - 05/06/07

Tonight's 60 Minutes featured a profile of Lou Dobbs by Lesley Stahl entitled Lou Dobbs, "Advocacy" Journalist? In the World of CBS, biased reporters - such as the dozens exposed in the entries here as well as Stahl herself, Ed Bradley, and Steve Kroft - are real journalists, but only Dobbs blurs the lines.

Maria Hinojosa/PBS Now interviews Chris Simcox - 05/05/07

Maria Hinojosa of PBS Now interviews the founder of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, Chris Simcox, here. I didn't listen to the interview, and I have a neutral position on Simcox and his group [1].

Max Blumenthal feverishly uncovers the "anti-immigrant" movement - 05/03/07

Max Blumenthal - aka "Son of Sid" - was interviewed by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! about the "anti-immigrant" movement with predictable results:

Ron Brynaert/Raw Story posts Tancredo smear - 04/02/07

Ron Brynaert of Raw Story says: Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-CO), a "dark horse" candidate for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination admitted in an interview that he is a "controversial figure" who is sometimes prone to saying "outrageous things." Last November, Esquire Magazine wrote, "Tancredo is Tancrazy. Made his name calling for mass deportations of illegal immigrants. Recently was the featured speaker at a meeting of the League of the South, described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a 'neo-Confederate hate group.' In a rare moment of clarity, he called his own suggestion...

NYT: the ACLU vouches for CAIR - 03/14/07

Neil MacFarquhar of the NYT offers a two-screener about unnamed sources running down CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations). That's the organization whose spokesman said in 1993 that he'd like to see the U.S.

Why is CBS 11 KTVT-TV Dallas misleading about immigration reform? - 02/18/07

Stephanie Lucero of CBS 11 TV out of Dallas offers "Immigration Debate Re-Energizing Hate Groups" concerning the recent Anti-Defamation League (ADL) claiming that KKK membership is up because of the debate over illegal immigration. That may well be true, but - needless to say - Lucero doesn't look into: a) whether this is an attempt by the ADL to smear all those opposed to illegal immigration, and b) whether this is an attempt by them to obtain donations. And, while the report features stock footage of Klan rallies, Lucero doesn't feature any new footage from her area. Rather, she interviews...

Tim Gaynor/Reuters: Democrats to save us from "nativists" - 12/26/06

Tim Gaynor of Reuters offers "Nativists fan flames of U.S. immigration debate". And, it's even worse than the title might indicate.

Is Michele Marcucci/Oakland Tribune biased? - 12/05/06

Michele R. Marcucci is a staff writer for the ANG Newspapers Group who appears to be based out of the Oakland Tribune. She offers the long article "Immigration group may not be what they seem" (orovillemr . com/news/bayarea/ci_4777376). It would be good journalism if she covered all sides of the issue, which she does not. Instead, while she reports on two supposed "nonwhite" groups actually being initiated by - gasp! - white people, she doesn't report on questionable activities by those on her apparent side of the issue.

NAU apologists - 11/24/06

[List below updated 12/11/07] Recently, Rep. Tom Tancredo was quoted as saying this: "People have to understand what we're talking about here. The president of the United States is an internationalist... He is going to do what he can to create a place where the idea of America is just that – it's an idea. It's not an actual place defined by borders. I mean this is where this guy is really going... I know this is dramatic – or maybe somebody would say overly dramatic – but I'm telling you, that everything I see leads me to believe that this whole idea of the North American Union, it's not...

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