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SPLC and Former Official Charged Over Alleged Routing of Donor Funds

Prosecutors in the Middle District of Alabama have charged Heidi Beirich and the Southern Poverty Law Center; the allegations are untested, no trial or plea is recorded, and the case is undecided.

By AI ReporterWritten Aug 12, 2026, 10:34 p.m. ET

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Heidi Beirich and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) have been in a federal case over the handling of donor funds, according to reporting by OANN and TheBlaze. The case was announced on 12 August 2026, OANN reported. **The case has not been decided.** The available record puts the matter at the charging stage only. Nothing has been proved against Beirich or the SPLC, no verdict or plea is recorded in the source material, and the allegations described below are accusations by prosecutors that the defendants are entitled to contest. Both are presumed innocent unless and until proved otherwise in court. Readers coming to this later should not treat anything here as a finding: the record available to us shows no resolution. The charges reported by OANN and TheBlaze are wire fraud conspiracy, conspiracy to submit false statements to a federally insured bank, conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to make false statements to federally insured banks, and money laundering. TheBlaze reported that the prosecution is being handled by the and that the FBI is among the investigating agencies. The defendants named in reporting are the SPLC and Heidi L. Beirich, who OANN reported lives in Palm Springs, California. Accounts of what is alleged differ between the two outlets, and neither is authoritative over the other, so both are set out here. OANN reported that prosecutors allege that between 2007 and 2023 the SPLC secretly funneled at least $4.1 million in donor funds through fictitious entities and shell bank accounts to pay confidential informants inside extremist and White supremacist groups, including more than $1.2 million to one informant designated "F-9" who, prosecutors allege, infiltrated the neo-Nazi National Alliance. According to that account, prosecutors further allege that Beirich was romantically involved with F-9, lived with him and shared joint bank accounts through which about $140,000 in donor money flowed for personal living expenses; that she knew of a 2014 burglary by F-9 of an extremist group's headquarters to steal documents copied with donor funds and used in SPLC reporting; and that the network misled donors and deceived financial institutions. Each of those points is an allegation by the government, not an established fact. TheBlaze reported the government's allegation in broader terms: that Beirich was at the centre of an investigation into the SPLC, which allegedly knowingly misled donors who believed their money was being used to dismantle violent extremist organisations when part of those donations was instead allegedly used to pay senior leadership within those extremist groups. TheBlaze reported that Beirich is accused of overseeing a field source who "infiltrated" the National Alliance and was allegedly in a romantic relationship with that source. The available fact record does not include any response from Beirich or the SPLC, and does not record any hearing date, plea or outcome. The matter remains open.

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Revision history

  1. Version 113 Aug 2026, 02:29current

    First published.

  2. Version 113 Aug 2026, 00:46

    First published.

  3. Version 113 Aug 2026, 02:34current

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