On The Rachel Maddow Show on May 4, 2026, Maddow described the federal case against the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “bizarre prosecution” of a “long time civil rights group” and suggested Trump’s DOJ may have lied to the grand jury. She pointed to the SPLC’s request for grand jury transcripts as evidence.
I can’t believe she gets paid $25 million a year for this once-a-week, anti-Trump, propaganda-filled show.
“Another federal judge, a judge in Alabama, is also weighing a very serious allegation, a potentially very consequential allegation that DOJ lawyers may have lied to the grand jury in a very high profile case in Alabama. This is the case about the Southern Poverty Law Center, where Trump’s DOJ has brought a bizarre prosecution against that longtime civil rights group, Southern Poverty Law Center. In responding to the indictment, they’ve done something very unusual now. They have now asked the judge in that case to allow them to see the transcript of what the lawyers from Trump’s DOJ actually told the grand jury behind closed doors. When they went in to talk to that grand jury to convince that grand jury to sign off on the indictment in this civil rights group.
They want to know what Trump’s DOJ lawyers said to that grand jury. This is a very rare request. This is a very unusual thing to request of the judge in a court case. The reason they have done it is because in this case, in the Southern Poverty Law Center case, the indictment really makes it seem like Trump’s Justice Department lawyers might have lied to the grand jury, might have told them things either about the civil rights group or about the law that were just factually wrong.”
On April 21, 2026, a federal grand jury in Alabama indicted the SPLC on 11 counts, including wire fraud, false statements to a federally insured bank, and conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering.
Prosecutors allege the SPLC secretly funneled more than $3 million in donated funds to people associated with violent extremist groups, including the KKK and Aryan Nations, while failing to disclose the informant program to donors.
This is a serious fraud case about alleged misuse of donor funds — not a “bizarre” political attack. The evidence will be tested in court.
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