Gavin McInnes Announces Defamation Lawsuit Against the Southern Poverty Law Center
Comedian and political commentator Gavin McInnes announced on Monday that he has filed a defamation lawsuit against the Southern Poverty Law Center.
In a statement provided to the Gateway Pundit, McInnes explained that they have “harassed me, my family, and my friends to a level of tortious interference that goes well into sabotage.”
The 70-page complaint was filed on Sunday evening in the Middle District of Alabama. The filing outlined defamation and other tortious acts resulting in reputational and economic damages to McInnes. He is being represented by the highly-respected First Amendment attorney Ron D. Coleman of Mandelbaum Salsburg P.C. and Baron Coleman of the Baron Coleman Law Firm.
https://twitter.com/roncoleman/status/1092427269463859205?s=21
According to the press release, McInnes is demanding an apology from the far-left organization for “purposefully misrepresenting his beliefs in a defamatory manner and the defamatory mischaracterization of a fraternal club he founded, Proud Boys.”
McInnes, who has been deplatformed across social media thanks to activist-reporters campaigning against him, said that the lawsuit was not just to protect him and his family, but everyone else as well.
“The SPLC has gone from a noble institution genuinely dedicated to eradicating hate to a hate group in and of itself that pretends this country is frothing with bigots desperate to foment World War III,” McInnes said in his announcement. “They purposely lie about their enemies in an attempt to ‘destroy’ them (their words) and it’s become a very effective way to make money. Scaremongering brought them the $50 million their founder originally set out to make. Since then, it’s garnered hundreds of millions including untold millions in the Cayman Islands. I don’t fault entrepreneurs, but they are using this incredible wealth to wield power over the innocent and destroy careers and businesses in their insatiable need to generate more bigots — because in the world of SPLC fundraising, mo hate is mo money.”
The comedian explained that he, and many others on the right, are tired of being portrayed as “racist, Islamophobic, sexist, homophobic, etc.” He stated that “it’s not true.”
“The vast majority of us are good people and getting us fired and deplatformed because we dare to support the president isn’t just a corrupt and immoral way to make money. It’s not just immoral. It’s un-American,” McInnes asserted.
McInnes said that he has been banned from all platforms — including PayPal — which he was using to help people get decent legal representation. The deplatforming has also left him unable to defend himself against the lies being spread about him online.
“My family has been attacked and so have my friends. The pro-Trump men’s club I started, the Proud Boys, have been rounded up and arrested facing serious felonies for daring to defend themselves against the radical left. It’s not just my circle of conservative Christians. Seemingly countless business and careers have been ‘destroyed’ (yes ‘destroyed’ – their word) by this group,” he said.
People aren’t just being deplatformed and having their livlihoods stripped from them, McInnes explained, their lists are also leading to violence.
“Leo Johnson was working security at the Family Research Council when he was shot by a man who saw them on the SPLC’s hate group list. The Steve Scalise shootings were inspired by the SPLC’s list. A professor at Middlebury College was hospitalized after daring to defend Charles Murray who was deemed verboten by the SPLC. When you see their hate map of America, you’d think you were living in Nazi Germany,” McInnes added.
McInnes said that he has “had enough” of the organization that is “pretending to fight hate while manifesting it out of thin air.” He said that their profitable lies and “relentless thirst for fake villains shows no signs of abating, and until we stop and say ‘no’ they will continue to portray this country as a dark and disgusting Klan rally populated with bigots determined to torture those who disagree.”
Coleman added that “this lawsuit has implications beyond Gavin McInnes because we’re challenging the use of deplatforming and defunding to privately censor speech. If we can’t stop this phenomenon now, the First Amendment will be rendered meaningless as dissent is silenced through private actors such as SPLC and its allies.”
Those who wish to contribute to his legal battle can do so here.
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