In one congressional investigation, the third time proved to be the charm. After two congressional hearings on the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), in which no SPLC spokesperson was present, the House Judiciary Committee finally cornered the nonprofit with a subpoena against interim president and CEO Bryan Fair. At the Tuesday hearing, “Manufacturing Hate, Part II,” House Judiciary Republicans finally got the chance to directly question the SPLC about their outrageous “hate map” designations of mainstream conservative organizations like Alliance Defending Freedom, who was also present.

In previous hearings, the SPLC had avoided direct scrutiny because the minority party had called witnesses from other organizations. When asked about something specific to the SPLC, such as its “hate map” designations, these witnesses evaded the issue with excuses like, “I don’t do designations.”

Now the House Judiciary Committee could ask those questions directly to Fair — not that they expected a full confession to spill forth. “I’m always hopeful that we can get something out,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) said beforehand on Monday night’s “Washington Watch.” “I certainly wouldn’t be advising him, if I were his lawyer, to be sitting in a public hearing copping to what we believe that they were up to.” But “we’ve got to pursue the truth … and see if we can get any questions answered.”

But Fair, for his part, seemed reluctant to answer even the most basic questions. When asked by Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), “Did the Southern Poverty Law Center use donor money to have field sources attend extremist rallies across the country?” it took Fair a full five seconds of silence to mumble, “Mr. Chairman —” and another five seconds to regain enough composure to answer, “We used donor money to pay confidential informants to infiltrate extremist organizations.” That was Jordan’s very first question, and Fair’s responsiveness did not improve from there.

In answer to a string of questions about the DOJ’s superseding indictment, Fair retreated through the classic, “not to my knowledge,” before eventually hunkering down behind the legal bunker, “Our counsel will respond to all the allegations in the middle district of Alabama.” Fair held this position for the rest of the hearing and even grew comfortable enough to pull out the answer readily by the second or third hour of the hearing.

Clearly, Fair was coached (if he had any coaching) to only use the legal line as a last-resort, fallback option. But if Fair had any other game plan, it clearly fell apart immediately under Jordan’s withering cross-examination.

Chairman Jordan was not impressed. “It seems to me, if the answer is no, you could say no,” he retorted. To this, Fair managed to respond, “We have asserted that the allegations are false” — that is, the SPLC is fighting the DOJ lawsuit in court. But noting that the SPLC asserted the allegations were false is not the same thing as declaring under oath (and penalty of perjury) that they were false, a move Fair conspicuously declined to make.

Likewise, Fair deflected, “Counsel will address all the allegations,” when Rep. Barry Moore (R-Ala.) asked, “Did the SPLC fundraiser emails to Alabama donors use the word ‘informant?’” Does the president of SPLC not know what is in his own organization’s mailers?

Again, Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Calif.) asked, “Did the SPLC arrange for the break-in and theft of documents from an extremist group?” Instead of wearing this like a badge of honor, Fair once again ducked behind his legal bulwark, “I believe that is an allegation in the indictment that will be discussed and responded to in the middle district of Alabama and the criminal case pending.”

Fair even used the legal excuse to cover ground not explicitly contained in the DOJ indictment. When asked to name the president of the National Socialist Party, Fair answered, “That’s an allegation in the indictment that will be responded to by counsel in the middle district of Alabama.” Of course, the name of a person listed on the SPLC hate map is not an allegation in the indictment; the indictment alleges that the SPLC paid this informant while fundraising off his supposed hate.

After Fair had dodged dozens of questions in this manner, Jordan tried a different approach, asking if the SPLC wished that it had never implemented its informant program, since it discontinued the program in 2023. After another extended pause, Fair responded, “We stopped the program because we believe hate and extremism has migrated significantly online, and into government agencies.” This was one of the more revelatory answers given, but not the most coherent. Jordan replied, “Wow, that’s big. That makes no sense.”

Indeed, Fair had just inadvertently charged the same Biden administration agencies that used SPLC as a resource with being full of extremism. Live speaking is full of hazards, especially when under oath, and certainly when underprepared.

Even when Republicans offered low-hanging fruit, Fair refused to pick it. “For example,” asked Rep. Russell Fry (R-S.C.), “if an individual is … overtly out in the public as the leader of a KKK chapter, they’re probably apt to be on the extremist files, based on their position, their statements, their association with the KKK. Is that fair to say?”

At first, Fair tried to punt that decision off to someone else, as witnesses in previous hearings had done. “That determination, Congressman Fry, would be made by the experts at the SPLC.” This tactic did not fly with Fry. After all, Fair represented the SPLC and should have greater insight into their methods for designating hate. The dialogue continued:

Fry: “Right. I mean, that would be an overt person, somebody that’s out in front of this. They would be more likely than not to be included on that file. Is that correct?”

Fair: “Could be, could be on the hate map. Could be on the hate list.”

Fry: “Is it truly objective or is it very subjective? I mean, it sounds like it’s this mysterious committee [that] decides who’s a hater and who’s not.”

Fair: “As my testimony shows, we use specific criteria.”

Fry: “But your testimony hasn’t.”

Fair seemed so shell-shocked by these questions that he even cowered behind this legal defense when facing friendly questions. “Can you explain what actions the SPLC took before the ‘Unite the Right’ rally in Charlottesville in an attempt to help law enforcement?” asked Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.). Fair replied timidly, “Uh, Congressman Nadler, again, uh, I must say that, uh, counsel will respond to all allegations in the indictment in the middle district of Alabama.” At this, Nadler was confused. “That’s not an allegation.”

Fair struggled to answer even the most routine questions. When Rep. Barry Moore (R-Ala.) asked him why he took the job as interim president of SPLC, Fair took a four-second pause before a hesitant answer, “Uh, because, uh, I’ve supported the SPLC and its mission for my entire life.”

One hopes Fair had a more eloquent and descriptive answer to this question prepared for his job interview. Or perhaps “president of SPLC” is no longer a job title with a lot of competition. That, in itself, would be a powerful commentary for such a wealthy organization. How many skeletons has it buried?

One would expect an organization with $822 million in assets to spend a bit more time preparing their CEO to face congressional scrutiny. But perhaps Fair was not really invested. He only agreed last July to serve as interim head of the scandal-ridden SPLC for one year, which meant that “my testimony today will be one of my last official acts in this role.”

A theme that resurfaced throughout the hearing was the interaction between the SPLC hate map and the 2012 shooting at Family Research Council headquarters. Fair said the hearing was the first time he ever saw the FBI footage of the shooter, Floyd Corkins, telling investigators he found FRC on the SPLC map. When Rep. Mark Harris (R-N.C.) asked Fair for his reaction to that video, Fair responded, “My reaction is that we condemn political violence,” but he repeatedly refused to take responsibility for the shooting or remove FRC from the SPLC hate map.

On the contrary, Fair defended FRC’s placement on the hate map, arguing that “the Family Research Council is listed on our map because it meets the criteria,” specifically for FRC’s opposition to the LGBT agenda. Elsewhere, Fair explained, “We list groups that demonize or vilify people based on immutable characteristics or that express anti-government conspiracy theories.”

But plentiful research establishes that sexual orientation and gender identity are not “immutable” characteristics for the simple reason that they can change over time. Thus, the SPLC’s recognition of these categories seems to be a departure from its stated definition of the groups it lists.

At the same time, Fair claimed that “The SPLC doesn’t identify any group based on religion. … We identify groups based on the statements they make that their leaders make, based on their activities that target various groups.” To this, Rep. Lance Gooden (R-Texas) responded, “Many of these statements are based on religious beliefs.”

While the DOJ indictment of SPLC featured prominently in the hearing, the hearing went further. As FRC President Tony Perkins observed on “Washington Watch,” “Al Capone got charged with tax evasion, but everybody knew that wasn’t the extent of what he did.” In the same way, “this is a much broader conspiracy.”

“The problem with the SPLC is that it’s trying to shut down debate in the public square,” summarized Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Vice President Ryan Bangert, who also testified. “And there are numerous examples of the SPLC colluding not just with law enforcement, but also major corporate actors to do exactly that.”

Jordan agreed, noting, “Regarding the First Amendment, I agree they can say whatever they darn well want.” But “when the organization colludes with corporations, colludes with banks, and — worse yet — colludes with the government to silence and go after people for political reasons or other groups for political reasons — like the Alliance Defending Freedom or the Family Research Council — that’s where the rub comes in.”

The SPLC was “given credibility by their relationship with the federal government,” Perkins posited, “and then they leaned on financial institutions to debunk — and the tech institutions did — deplatform conservatives. So the Biden and the Obama administration actually created them as a really a pit bull to go out there, off of a leash, so they couldn’t be connected to the federal government, to intimidate these other businesses to go after conservatives.”

Perkins proposed to Roy that “at some point Congress might call in some of these financial institutions and ask them about this conspiracy that they were involved in with SPLC. … What makes it different with the banks is that they are federally regulated institutions.”

“Any time that a designation by a nonprofit that’s politically unaccountable is being used by federally regulated banks to discriminate based on religious belief, that’s something that the government should be aware [of],” Bangert warned.

In his preview with Perkins, Roy agreed that “The Southern Poverty Law Center has a sort of special place in this network of the Marxist Left,” and that their influence on financial institutions should be investigated further. Unfortunately, time did not permit him to raise the issue at Tuesday’s hearing, and Roy contented himself with a warning shot, “if I had a little more time, I’d like to have a little bit more conversation about debanking.”

The reason for bringing the heat is that it is the only way to deter bad behavior, Roy said. “Remember the summer of 2020 when all that was happening in the wake of George Floyd? How many businesses were burned? How many people lost their lives? This radical Marxist Left will not be deterred unless we deter them.”

For his part, SPLC interim President Bryan Fair may have viewed his Tuesday testimony as a qualified success. Sure, there were some awkward moments, and any grand plan to advance his narrative quickly collapsed. But he managed to survive several hours of piercing questions without saying anything disastrous. In a few weeks, he will leave the organization and return to his professorial role.

For the SPLC, however, scrutiny has only begun. The DOJ indictment and a series of congressional hearings has only begun to scratch the surface of its shady dealings. The spotlight of public scrutiny will continue.