Focus on the Family’s president Jim Daly is holding back no punches after the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) recently added the ministry to its “hate group” list. “Southern Poverty Law Center made the decision in some kind of criteria that they, and only they know, and that is to put us on the hate list. I think, again, it exemplifies what’s wrong with the culture right now—that we can’t have differing opinions on things,” he told Fox News. Daly stated that the ministry’s support for traditional marriage between one man and on woman has earned the ire of the SPLC. He said despite the culture’s growing acceptance of gay marriage, the ministry would not change its stance. “For us, we can’t relent on changing what we believed to be scriptural truth for the current place of where the culture is at,” he said. “For some reason that then deems us as a hate group. It’s very discouraging really, because I think the SPLC started in a good place… but they have turned that muscle now on the Christian community.”

Being added to the SPLC’s list can have serious consequences, with Daly stating the ministry has already experienced protests since being added to the list. “We had protesters harassing our employees coming into the door here… so we had to get and pay for extra police presence on our campus. It raises danger for everybody,” he said. “I don’t know if that’s their motivation, but it is a consequence.” He shared the organization’s many contributions to the community, including offering marriage resources to hundreds of thousands of people. “This is not hate. This is the love of Christ trying to show people God’s design for marriage and parenting and people,” he said.

In an op-ed for Town Hall, Tom Tradup, VP/News & Talk Programming at Salem Radio Network called the SPLC “a far left and anti-Christian website whose sole purpose apparently is to attack pro-family groups which espouse traditional American values.” Tradup noted that Focus has avoided any large scandals within its ministry during the 20 years it has been led by Daly, whereas the SPLC’s founder, Morris Dees, who was fired for “misconduct.” Gary Schneeberger, an assistant to Daly, stated in an interview with Salem that he was surprised it took so long to get on the list. “We’ve been sort of hate-adjacent on their list for years…they said some things about us that weren’t positive but until now we’ve never made the list,” he said. “Some people in our organization started laughing when they heard this. We’ve been on the same mission for nearly 50 years and they’re just now seeing who we are?” After reviewing the SPLC’s reason for adding Focus on the list, Schneeberger said the SPLC’s issue seems to be simply that Focus believes in the Bible. “And it is not hateful to push back on anything in the area of public policy,” he said. “Especially when some group challenges Biblical truth and holy conviction.”