ADL and SPLC work with feds to weaponize JOG against dissidents

[Will Williams]

The list of “hate groups” sent by the US Treasury Department to US and overseas banks was compiled by the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center. This list of “73 US-based hate groups” is from “Bankrolling Bigotry: An Overview of the Online Funding Strategies of American Hate Groups,” a report issued in October 2020 by two British-based groups.
This 36-page report is posted at https://www.isdglobal.org/wp-content/up ... otry-3.pdf

The report urges financial institutions and platforms such as PayPal to cancel or withhold services to alleged “hate groups.” It also recommends that the US Congress consider measures so that “hate groups” cannot qualify for non-profit status.

Among the groups “identified” by the ADL and the SPLC and cited in the report are:
American Renaissance (New Century Foundation)
VDARE
Family Research Council
Eagle Forum
Numbers USA
National Alliance
Institute for Historical Review

List of hate groups circulated
by [JOG] to banks included
top conservative organization
By Valerie Richardson
The Washington Times
Friday, March 8, 2024

The federal government circulated a list of “hate groups” to U.S. banks as part of its financial surveillance after Jan. 6, 2021, a tally compiled by left-of-center groups that featured a host of mainstream conservative organizations.

They included the Alliance Defending Freedom, Family Research Council, Liberty Counsel, Pacific Justice Institute, and Federation for American Immigration Reform, according to an investigation by the House Judiciary select subcommittee on the weaponization of the federal government.

The list was lifted from a 2020 report titled “Bankrolling Bigotry” by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue and the Global Disinformation Index, a pair of left-wing advocacy groups based in London, and distributed in January 2021 by the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN.

“FinCEN circulated the ISD report to some of the largest financial institutions in the world, including the very financial institutions that are likely responsible for providing financial services to many of the listed ‘hate groups,’ without regard for the chilling effect it would have on protected speech and its potential to be weaponized against the groups by financial institutions,” the subcommittee said.

In addition, the list “draws a false equivalency between certain conservative civil society groups and the American Nazi Party and the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, suggesting FinCEN views them equally,” said the subcommittee report, released Wednesday.

The panel’s report, “Financial Surveillance in the United States: How Federal Law Enforcement Commandeered Financial Institutions to Spy on Americans,” focused on the FBI’s mining of bank records to head off any threats to the Jan. 20, 2021, inauguration of President-elect Joseph R. Biden after the Capitol riot.

Federal law enforcement asked financial institutions to “conduct sweeping searches of individuals not suspected of committing any crimes,” the report said, by filtering Zelle payments with keywords such as “MAGA” and “TRUMP” and flagging purchases at firearms stores such as Cabela’s, Bass Pro Shop and Dick’s Sporting Goods.

Federal authorities warned that “those Americans who expressed opposition to firearm regulations, open borders, COVID-19 lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and the ‘deep state’ may be potential domestic terrorists,” the subcommittee said.

In addition, the agency distributed a hyperlink to the Anti-Defamation League’s Hate on Display database, a list of racist symbols that includes the Celtic cross. The ADL acknowledged that the popular cross design is a “very common symbol and primarily used by non-extremists.”

The findings raised alarm about the federal government’s role in promoting the de-banking of conservative organizations by discrediting them with financial institutions, an issue already drawing concern on the right.

The Treasury Department confirmed last month that it supported law enforcement efforts to identify those involved in the Jan. 6 riot by suggesting keywords for financial surveillance, which also included “Biden,” “Kamala” and “Antifa.”

“We understand that FinCen convened these Exchange events starting under the prior Administration and continuing until approximately mid-February 2021,” said the Feb. 9 letter to Sen. Tim Scott, South Carolina Republican, posted on Fox News.

Jeremy Tedesco, Alliance Defending Freedom senior counsel, told the subcommittee at a hearing Thursday that “viewpoint-based de-banking is on the rise.”

He cited several examples.

In April, Bank of America closed the account of Indigenous Advance Ministries of Tennessee after eight years. The bank told the group working with Ugandan orphans and at-risk children that it “no longer aligns with the bank’s risk tolerance,” Mr. Tedesco said.

In 2022, JPMorgan Chase closed the newly opened account of the National Committee for Religious Freedom, founded by former Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback. Chase has been accused of religious discrimination, which the bank has denied.

Mr. Tedesco accused the federal government of colluding with the financial industry “to censor Americans with mainstream conservative and religious views.”

“This Orwellian surveillance of American citizens has no place in a free society. Neither does the federal government’s weaponization of the financial industry against peaceable religious and conservative groups,” he said. “We won’t allow the federal government to treat us like domestic terrorists, nor accept its bullying and Big Brother tactics.”

This isn’t the first time the Biden administration has been accused of relying on left-wing groups to target conservatives.

The FBI was pilloried for a January 2023 memo from its Richmond, Virginia, office that named “radical-traditionalist Catholics” as a potential domestic terrorism threat based on sources that included the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center. The FBI retracted the memo shortly after it was leaked.

Note: This article has been edited to make clear the federal government began its financial surveillance beginning in the Trump administration and continuing in the Biden administration.

• Valerie Richardson can be reached at [email protected].
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/20 ... n-adminis/

[Jim Mathias]

A grave concern, especially for non-profit organizations.