Republican officials’ crusade against the Southern Poverty Law Center is a continuation of the MAGA movement’s efforts to obscure and lie about the reality of white supremacy in the United States.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is no stranger to Jim Crow-style investigations (however unsuccessful), announced on Monday a probe of the organization that made its reputation for exposing white supremacist groups like the Ku Klux Klan.

“The radical, woke SPLC was funding the very groups it was claiming to oppose. My office will ensure that the organization is held accountable for its blatant deception,” Paxton said in a press release. “Donors of the SPLC deserve to know if they have been manipulated into supporting a non-profit that gives millions of dollars to the KKK and other groups that they thought they were opposing.”

GOP attacks on the SPLC, the most prominent being the Justice Department’s reportedly rushed indictment of the group for fraud, stem from allegations that the organization lied to its donors about what it was doing as it was secretly funding (by paying confidential informants) the groups it claimed to fight. These allegations have come at a cost to the SPLC. Since the indictment, investment firms like Vanguard and Fidelity have prevented customers from using their respective charitable donation platforms to make payments to the organization .

Ja’han Jones

Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.