"Accused of funding a hate group"/ NYP: Soros and Clooney remain silent after the scandal broke out

2026-04-24 15:43:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

"Accused of funding a hate group"/ NYP: Soros and Clooney remain

Celebrity donors to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), including George Clooney and George Soros, have remained silent amid allegations that the nonprofit has funneled more than $3 million to the hate groups it claims to fight.

The SPLC was charged with bank fraud and money laundering on Wednesday, on suspicion of funding at least eight leaders and members of extremist groups, all done in secret from its major benefactors.

Clooney and Soros' foundations, along with MGM Resorts and other high-profile backers, have not commented on the Justice Department's indictment.

They have also ignored The Post's requests for comment regarding the SPLC indictment, in which federal prosecutors alleged that insiders from extremist groups paid by the nonprofit helped spread hateful content.

Many of the SPLC's donors, including Clooney's foundation, former Apple CEO Tim Cook, and JPMorgan, contributed to the organization after clashes at a 2017 "Unite the Right" rally in Virginia, which resulted in the death of a protester.

According to the Justice Department's indictment, those donors had no idea that the SPLC was allegedly sending money to one of the people involved in organizing the rally in question.

Other notable donors to the SPLC include Soros' Open Society Foundations, OpenAI, and Chick-fil-A.

Chick-fil-A — which was heavily criticized by Christian groups for a 2017 donation to the SPLC — responded to The Post.

"Our mention of this is based on a one-time donation of $2,500 made nearly 10 years ago at the request of a former advisory board member. This is not an organization that Chick-fil-A is involved with or supports in any capacity," the response said.

The Justice Department alleges that the organization defrauded both donors and law enforcement by paying undercover “F” agents tasked with gathering intelligence and conducting espionage within groups including the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Nations, and the National Socialist American Nazi Party.

But the large amount of money spent on these efforts has made civil rights activists suspicious of the group's motives.

For example, the group paid about $270,000 over an eight-year period to a “Unite the Right” leader directly involved in organizing the infamous rally in Charlottesville, at which participants chanted racist slogans and waved Nazi flags.

Critics include activists like Bob Woodson, an 89-year-old civil rights champion who faced prison for his advocacy in the Jim Crow South, and Curtis T. Hill Jr., the former attorney general for Indiana who now serves as an ambassador for the black leadership network Project 21. /Retrieved from the New York Post