{"id":591754,"date":"2026-04-26T16:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T16:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=591754"},"modified":"2026-04-26T16:15:00","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T16:15:00","slug":"was-the-atlantics-kash-patel-smear-a-setup-to-discredit-the-splc-indictment-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=591754","title":{"rendered":"Was The Atlantic’s Kash Patel Smear A Setup To Discredit The SPLC Indictment?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Was The Atlantic’s Kash Patel Smear A Setup To Discredit The SPLC Indictment?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

On April 17, The Atlantic<\/em> published an anonymously sourced hit piece against FBI Director Kash Patel<\/strong> –\u00a0painting him as a blackout-drunk, paranoid, and erratic executive barely capable of running the nation’s premier law enforcement agency. Three days later, a federal grand jury indicted the Southern Poverty Law Center for wire fraud, false statements, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The question conservative circles are now asking is whether the hit piece was deliberately conceived and timed to discredit Patel and the SPLC investigation.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Democrats pounced on The Atlantic<\/em> hit piece, launching an investigation into his behavior the same day that the SPLC indictment was announced.<\/p>\n

\n

And that was the point of the Atlantic story. See how that works. https:\/\/t.co\/WRjlc4twIQ<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Insurrection Barbie (@DefiyantlyFree) April 22, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to the Department of Justice, between 2014 and 2023, the organization secretly funneled more than $3 million <\/strong>in donated funds to individuals associated with violent extremist groups – including the Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Nations, American Nazi Party, and the National Socialist Party of America.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

“They use their donor network to raise money to purportedly dismantle violent extremist groups. However, the SPLC \u2014 the Southern Poverty Law Center \u2014 used the money they raised from their donor network to actually pay the leadership of these very groups,\u201d Patel said at the announcement. \u201cThey used the fraudulently raised money by lying to their donor network, thousands of Americans, to go ahead and actually pay the leadership of these supposed violent extremist groups.\u201d<\/p>\n

Patel added, \u201cThey attempted to hide their criminal activity from our financial banking network.<\/strong> They set up shell companies and entities around America so that the financial institutions that we rely on as everyday Americans were deceived in believing that money was not coming from the Southern Poverty Law Center in the perpetration of this scheme and fraud, but rather fictitious entities they stood up to perpetuate this ongoing fraud.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\ud83d\udea8BREAKING: DOJ charges the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) with wire fraud, false statements, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.<\/p>\n

The SPLC secretly funneled $3M+ in donor funds to violent racist extremist groups:<\/p>\n

-Ku Klux Klan
\n-American Nazi Party
\n-Aryan Nation\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/0hcf2sH9LZ<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) April 21, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Atlantic <\/em>is owned by<\/u><\/a> Laurene Powell Jobs through her Emerson Collective, which holds a majority stake in the magazine. And her connection to the SPLC goes back a long time. In a 2018 Washington Post<\/em> profile, the paper described<\/u><\/a> her very personal connection to the SPLC:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

Laurene Powell made her first foray into philanthropy near the beginning of high school in West Milford. She learned of the work of the Southern Poverty Law Center and dipped into her savings to send a cashier\u2019s check of about $20. She got a form thank-you letter back from civil rights crusader Morris Dees. \u201cThey would reliably write to me a couple of times a year,\u201d she says. \u201cI would read them over and over, and they told really beautiful stories. I was always animated by the notion of who gets the opportunity and who doesn\u2019t.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In 2019, Powell Jobs reportedly revealed that she\u2019d been anonymously funding the SPLC for years.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n

Lauren Powell Jobs, May 27, 2019:<\/p>\n

“We do all of our philanthropic giving anonymously. But we had been funding SPLC and we decided that we wanted to do some teaching tolerance curriculum in partnership with them. And so one of our team members was actually talking to Morris Dees,\u2026 https:\/\/t.co\/9vVsXCjO8V<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Erica Knight (@_EricaKnight) April 22, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The SPLC wasn’t just a charity she supported. It was, by her own account, the organization that introduced her to philanthropy.<\/p>\n

Former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino revealed earlier this week that he believes something larger is operating underneath the surface. “The hit on Kash Patel, the bullshit hit by The Atlantic<\/em>, which I addressed yesterday, is gonna make a lot more sense in the coming weeks and months<\/strong>,” he said. “I can’t give you a definitive timeline. I’m on the outside now. However, I can tell you what I know is going on because I started a lot of it.”<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cI promise this thing is gonna make a whole lot of sense. You’re gonna find out, as they say in the South, right quick about why they need him out, like, now. It’s got nothing to do with that story being even remotely true. Remember this. Bookmark it.”<\/p>\n

\n

\ud83d\udea8\ud83d\udea8\ud83d\udea8 @dbongino<\/a>: “I promise you this. Look at me. Everybody zoom in. Focker, look at me… The hit on Kash Patel is going to make a lot of sense very soon. There’s a reason the media and Democrats want him out NOW. Flag it.” \ud83d\udea9 pic.twitter.com\/oizQlLtq0I<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Bongino Report (@BonginoReport) April 21, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Whether he was referring to the connection between The Atlantic<\/em> and SPLC is not clear, but the hit piece dropped days before that indictment became public, and the SPLC would have had reason to anticipate charges were coming. The Atlantic<\/em> hit piece bought time, diverted attention, and handed critics a ready-made narrative to undermine Patel’s credibility at exactly the moment it mattered most.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nSun, 04\/26\/2026 – 12:15<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Was The Atlantic’s Kash Patel Smear A Setup To Discredit The SPLC Indictment? On April 17, The Atlantic published an anonymously sourced hit piece against FBI Director Kash Patel –\u00a0painting him as a blackout-drunk, paranoid, and erratic executive barely capable of running the nation’s premier law enforcement agency. Three days later, a federal grand jury… Continue reading Was The Atlantic’s Kash Patel Smear A Setup To Discredit The SPLC Indictment?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":591744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[20,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-591754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economic-empowerment","category-national-security","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=591754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/591744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=591754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=591754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=591754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}