The FBI case against the Southern Poverty Law Center basically says that if you donate money to the SPLC, then they use some of it to pay informants to infiltrate white nationalist organizations to uncover stuff like this.

[rangerrick@redwombat.social]

@arclight must be some kind of virus

[mathowie@xoxo.zone]

@mastodonmigration @mekkaokereke maybe that’s the goal of Trumps admin here? You make baseless threats against a nonprofit doing important work you don’t like in order to freeze their funding sources before the whole thing is thrown out in court a year later?

[w_b@mastodon.world]

@mathowie @mekkaokereke

He hates colored people.

Orange is a color. Deport his ass.

#racist #splc #Orange

[arclight@oldbytes.space]

@RangerRick It's the only way I can explain it. Or some weird involuntary twitching like the condition where people uncontrollably give Cybertruck drivers the finger. It would be wild if those were related.

[jhaas@a2mi.social]

@mathowie @mastodonmigration @mekkaokereke The direction this eventually goes is getting them declared a type of organization that permits them to be de-banked. They'll be cut off from their finances prior to that happening.

[dxzdb@mastodon.social]

@mathowie @mekkaokereke Digging around I find another case of Fidelity doing this and a couple theories:
1) The SPLC indictment forces Fidelity to not fund them. Similar to the NRA?
2) The regime might be trying to change SPLC's charity status & Fidelity would also be forced to not allow funds to go there.

I'm not sure why one would set up a charitable giving account ... but it would seem like you could divert money from there or somewhere else outside of Fidelity to do what you want, right?

[w_b@mastodon.world]

@draken @mekkaokereke

Save the penis for Brainworm

[being@social.ornella.xyz]

@mekkaokereke I knew someone who did this job a few years ago, nice!

[bongolian@mstdn.social]

@jhaas @mathowie @mastodonmigration @mekkaokereke The evidence for the criminal charges are flimsy. They approach but go short of charging the #SPLC of a terrorist organization, likely because the #DoJ couldn't muster up even a flimsy level of evidence for that charge.

In Trump's America, fighting back against the KKK is now basically an act of "terrorism."

The Justice Department brought charges against a major civil rights organization. This will be Trump's template for prosecuting the entire American left.

(www.defiance.news)

[franceskamann@freeradical.zone]

@not2b @mekkaokereke

They sent the mailer out 2 to 3 years ago. I did a search online, but the Internet is not so good anymore.

[bongolian@mstdn.social]

@dxzdb @mathowie @mekkaokereke Charitable giving accounts serve two purposes: 1) They allow one to sell highly-appreciated stock and mutual funds without paying tax on the profits. 2) They give a person a tax deduction in the same year that they are funded even if the final destination charity of the funds does not receive it that year. This is achieved because Fidelity Charitable itself is officially a charity even though it is just a conduit.

[bongolian@mstdn.social]

@mathowie @mekkaokereke Fidelity did give an email address to complain. I don't think that they're likely to change this while the lawsuit is pending. The timing of Fidelity's change (Thursday-Friday) is almost certainly based on the lawsuit (last Tuesday). Here are some resources if you decide to write to Fidelity:
https://www.defiance.news/p/in-trumps-america-fighting-back-against
https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-statement-on-the-southern-poverty-law-center
https://www.contrariannews.org/p/splc-indictment-reactions

[ianagol@mathstodon.xyz]

@mathowie @mekkaokereke Now it’s not even showing up in the list of charities on Fidelity Charitable.

[curtosis@lingo.lol]

@Bongolian @dxzdb @mathowie @mekkaokereke Yep, and this is key: Fidelity Charitable is itself a charity, and you aren’t in *control* of the money you give it. That’s why donating to it can give you a tax break.

It’s “donor-advised” so you can *request* how you’d like your giving to be allocated, but legally it’s FC and not you making the grant, so they can apply their own rules.

[pork_soda@friendsofdesoto.social]

@mathowie @mekkaokereke EDITED: actually I need to test this with Edward Jones & see if they’re still honoring requests to SPLC

[dxzdb@mastodon.social]

@curtosis @Bongolian @mathowie @mekkaokereke Thanks for the explanations! That all makes sense - but it's a odd/new concept for me to not be able to control where your charity money goes.

[wonka@chaos.social]

So, the Trump administration now engages in SLAPP against SPLC (and probably others)?

@Bongolian @jhaas @mathowie @mastodonmigration @mekkaokereke

[femme_mal@mstdn.social]

@wonka @Bongolian @jhaas @mathowie @mastodonmigration @mekkaokereke That, right there, of course.

What else would we expect white supremacists and white nationalists to do to a nonprofit organization which identifies white supremacist and white nationalist hate groups but defame and de-bank them using SLAPP methods?

[mikesax@mas.to]

@mathowie @mekkaokereke Oh wow. Well, it only strengthens our resolve… and there are a lot more of us than there are of them.

[cmdrmoto@hachyderm.io]

@mathowie @MissGayle @mekkaokereke And *this* is the kind of bypassing-a-repressive-regime’s-bullshit that the cypherpunks had in mind when they were designing Bitcoin.

The subsequent crypto scamtasia proved to be an extremely effective mechanism for discrediting the idea.

One might be inspired to speculate about which people had what capital / political / intellectual incentives in the drama that we see today.