The law firm Perkins Coie stands at the center of many Democrat smear campaigns (including the infamous Trump-Russia dossier compiled by Christopher Steele). On Wednesday the firm hired a former chairman of the board at the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the Left-wing smear factory that brands conservative and Christian groups “hate groups.”
Alan Howard, a commercial litigator at the firm Crowell & Moring, joined Perkins Coie’s New York City office Wednesday. Howard and his coworker Edwin Baum moved from Crowell to Perkins Coie together, saying that “staying together was crucial.” Perkins Coie is set to move to larger space in the Big Apple, and already has about 50 lawyers.
Howard served as chair of the board of directors of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).
The SPLC has come under fire for smearing conservative and Christian organizations as “hate groups,” listing them along with the Ku Klux Klan and plotting them on a “hate map” that has inspired at least one terrorist attack.
This summer, the SPLC paid a $3.375 million settlement to Maajid Nawaz, a Muslim reformer the group had defamed as an “anti-Muslim extremist,” because he went to a strip club on his bachelor party. After this news, approximately 60 organizations have considered legal action against the organization.
Besides Nawaz, two other groups have pending lawsuits against the SPLC — the Christian ministries Liberty Counsel and D. James Kennedy Ministries. The SPLC’s “hate group” list includes other Christian organizations like the Family Research Council (FRC), the American Family Association (AFA), Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the Ruth Institute, and more. It also includes conservative groups like the American College of Pediatricians and the Center for Immigration Studies.
The “hate group” designations are more than just slander. In 2012, a terrorist by the name of Floyd Corkins II targeted the Family Research Council, and he later told the FBI that he chose the group specifically because it was on the SPLC “hate map.”
Besides the Nawaz settlement, the group has a long train of embarrassing apologies. It apologized to Ben Carson after marking him an extremist for saying that marriage should be between one man and one woman. It apologized to the innocent town of Amana Colonies after marking it on a “hate map” as the site of the white nationalist website the Daily Stormer. It also apologized to Stonewall Elementary School for marking it on a Confederate monument “hate map” when the school was named after a stone wall, not General “Stonewall” Jackson.
Despite this checkered track record, social media companies like Amazon, Google, and Twitter rely on the “hate group” list. Apple has partnered with the SPLC. Democrats, the mainstream media, and even television programs have cited their “hate group” labels as gospel truth. Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) even demanded Amazon.com stop carrying any products from organizations identified as “hate groups” by the SPLC.
Last week, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson reported that the FBI has an “ongoing” relationship with the SPLC, despite the fact that many federal agencies have distanced themselves from the group in the wake of the 2012 terror attack.
Perkins Coie and the SPLC seem perfect for one another. The law firm has often served as the go-between for Democrat campaigns attempting to smear Republican opponents. In 2012, Obama for America (OFA) funded Fusion GPS in a smear campaign against Mitt Romney, using Perkins Coie as the go-between. The Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee did the same thing in 2016 for the Trump dossier.
Once again, the FBI cited the Trump dossier in its four FISA requests for surveillance on Trump campaign staffer Carter Page, without independently verifying it first!
As the 2018 elections near and the 2020 Democratic primary ramps up shortly afterward, PJ Media will keep watch on Perkins Coie and the SPLC, to see which Democrats will follow Obama’s and Clinton’s lead in using Perkins Coie to hide any more opposition research. This Left-wing smear nexus may grow to define the Democratic Party, if it does not already.
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