Southern Poverty Law Center Employee Arrested In Atlanta Riot, Blames Police Instead
A lawyer for the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center was arrested for his role in an attack on Atlanta Police and its property. Thomas Jurgens was arrested and released on domestic terrorism charges related to an attack on Sunday by Antifa and other far-left anti-police activists. The group was ostensibly protesting the construction of a $90 million police training complex they have dubbed “Cop City.”
From Fox News:
“On March 5, 2023, a group of violent agitators used the cover of a peaceful protest of the proposed Atlanta Public Safety Training Center to conduct a coordinated attack on construction equipment and police officers. They changed into black clothing and entered the construction area and began to throw large rocks, bricks, Molotov cocktails, and fireworks at police officers,” the Atlanta PD said in a statement when it released the booking photos for the 23 people charged.
The Southern Poverty Law Center released a statement about Jurgens’s arrest.
“An employee at the SPLC was arrested while acting — and identifying — as a legal observer on behalf of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG). The employee is an experienced legal observer, and their arrest is not evidence of any crime, but of heavy-handed law enforcement intervention against protesters.
“This is part of a months-long escalation of policing tactics against protesters and observers who oppose the destruction of the Weelaunee Forest to build a police training facility. The SPLC has and will continue to urge de-escalation of violence and police use of force against Black, Brown and Indigenous communities — working in partnership with these communities to dismantle white supremacy, strengthen intersectional movements and advance the human rights of all people.”
The SPLC’s decision to condemn the Atlanta Police Department for arresting people who are alleged to have used violence against them is strange but not surprising. Legal analysts and others questioned the SPLC’s decision to blame the police for their employee’s arrest. Instead, they pointed out that other, more responsible organizations would’ve said something about letting the legal process play itself out while not commenting any further.
If the roles were reversed and someone who worked for a right-wing organization did what Jurgens is alleged to have done, the SPLC would likely join in on the attacks of that organization and on conservatives in general. Remember, the SPLC has classified several mainstream conservative organizations as “hate groups” but has not done the same for violent left-wing groups.
The SPLC’s designation of conservative organizations as hate groups has even led to violence. In 2012, a terrorist attacked the Family Research Center’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., wounding a security guard who successfully prevented more casualties by tackling him. The shooter claims he was motivated to carry out the attack when he saw the organization on the SPLC’s “hate map.”
The SPLC has also come under criticism for its finances. It has an unusually large endowment and offshore accounts in the Cayman Islands. A former SPLC staffer has come forward as a whistleblower to allege the SPLC exaggerates hate in order to raise money.
The SPLC is a garbage organization that exaggerates hate for profit. If racial, religious, and gender hate did not exist, the SPLC would have to invent it in order to keep its business model going. We should not be surprised when they blame the victim when one of their own is arrested.
