WFB: The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a liberal, Alabama-based legal advocacy nonprofit and civil rights watchdog, recently refused to designate the radical leftist movement known as “antifa” as a “hate group,” despite acknowledging that its members use violence and oppose free speech.
The SPLC’s president, Richard Cohen, toldthe Washington Examiner over the weekend that his organization condemns antifa as “wrongheaded” for using violence and opposing free speech
“We oppose these groups and what they’re trying to do. We just don’t think anyone should be able to censor someone else’s speech,” Cohen said. “We think they are contributing to the problem we are seeing. We think it’s likely to lead to other forms of retaliation.”
However, Cohen refused to label antifa a “hate group” since its members do not discriminate on the basis of race, sexual orientation, or other categories protected by anti-discrimination law.
“There might be forms of hate out there that you may consider hateful, but it’s not the type of hate we follow,” he said.
The FBI and Department of Homeland Security have been warning state and local authorities since early 2016 that antifa had become increasingly violent, describing its members as “anarchist extremists.” DHS formally classified their activities as “domestic terrorist violence.”…
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center Won’t Call Antifa a ‘Hate Group’ Despite Violence, Censorship Efforts