An Open Letter to Benevity: Stop Using the SPLC’s Discredited “Hate List”

June 8, 2026

From organizations slanderously placed on the SPLC’s “Hate List.”

To Soraya Alexander and the leadership of Benevity:

We, the undersigned organizations, urge Benevity to immediately end its use of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s (SPLC) “Hate Map” and “Hate List” in determining which nonprofits are eligible for corporate charitable giving and employee matching programs.¹ By relying on these partisan designations, Benevity legitimizes a severely biased blacklist that inspires violence, urges discrimination against mainstream organizations, and undermines the spirit of charitable giving.

The SPLC’s list has already caused real harm. In 2012, a gunman entered the Family Research Council’s Washington, D.C. headquarters intending to commit mass murder. He later admitted that he chose his target after seeing it labeled on the SPLC’s website.² By using the SPLC’s lists to vet charities, Benevity reinforces and perpetuates a dangerous mechanism that has already been used to justify violence against peaceful Americans.

The situation surrounding Turning Point USA underscores this danger with tragic clarity. The organization was added to the SPLC’s Hate List in 2024 and targeted in a hostile SPLC article in May 2025. Just one day before the assassination of its founder, Charlie Kirk, the SPLC featured Turning Point USA in its Hatewatch newsletter. While federal authorities have not yet confirmed whether the assassin accessed the SPLC’s website, the timing and context raise deeply troubling questions.

The SPLC’s claim to be a civil rights organization cannot be taken seriously. Instead, it is a political weapon that targets mainstream libertarian, conservative, religious, and family advocacy organizations for ideological reasons. Groups such as Alliance Defending Freedom, Focus on the Family, and Turning Point USA have all been branded as “hate groups” – not because of violence or extremism, but because they dissent from SPLC’s preferred progressive orthodoxy. SPLC leadership itself has admitted that its ultimate goal is not to educate the public but to “destroy” its ideological opponents.³

There are also recent reports of employees from major corporations that Benevity’s system blocked them from donating to Turning Point USA because of the SPLC’s designation. At the same time, left-leaning political groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center and Planned Parenthood remain fully eligible for Benevity’s platform.⁴ Benevity’s reliance on the SPLC’s labels effectively blocks employees from donating to organizations that reflect their values, while favoring others that align with one side of the political spectrum.

Benevity facilitates billions of dollars in charitable giving each year, and independent research by the 1792 Exchange has identified over 200 major corporations that likely use Benevity’s platform for charitable giving, restricting employees’ freedom to give to mainstream organizations and legitimizing a tool linked to acts of violence. With such influence comes responsibility. By outsourcing moral judgment to the SPLC, an organization widely criticized for inflating “hate” labels to raise money, Benevity compromises its credibility and the integrity of corporate philanthropy.⁵

As organizations that have been unjustly placed on the SPLC’s “Hate List,” we call on Benevity to immediately, publicly end its use of the SPLC’s Hate List and Hate Map, adopt a viewpoint-neutral process for nonprofit eligibility, and restore access to organizations unfairly excluded.

This moment also presents a valuable opportunity for Benevity’s new CEO to start off on the right foot by demonstrating a commitment to fairness, transparency, and genuine diversity of thought. Taking this step would signal to millions of donors and thousands of companies that Benevity values open participation and rejects political discrimination in philanthropy.

We also call on corporations using Benevity’s platform to demand that Benevity reform its criteria and exclude SPLC’s Hate List or discontinue their partnership with Benevity until these changes are made.

Charitable giving should empower generosity, not enforce ideology.

Signed,

Alliance Defending Freedom
American Family Association
Center for Christian Virtue
David Horowitz Freedom Center
Defending Education
Do No Harm
Family Policy Alliance
Family Research Council
Focus on the Family
GenSpect
Moms for Liberty
Partners for Ethical Care
PragerU
1792 Exchange
Them Before Us
Turning Point USA