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SPLC President Richard Cohen Resigns From Embattled Left-Wing Nonprofit

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Southern Poverty Law Center president Richard Cohen resigned Friday, in the latest blow to the embattled left-wing nonprofit.

Cohen’s resignation came nine days after the SPLC fired co-founder Morris Dees on March 13, citing unspecified conduct issues.

Cohen announced his resignation in a staff-wide email Friday evening, the Los Angeles Times reported.

“Whatever problems exist at the SPLC happened on my watch, so I take responsibility for them,” Cohen’s email read, according to the Times.

Current and former SPLC employees have accused the organization of turning a blind eye to sexual harassment and racial discrimination within its own ranks. (RELATED: ‘Highly Profitable Scam’: Former SPLC Staffers Come Clean)

(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Richard Cohen, President of the Southern Poverty Law Center, speaks during a press conference November 29, 2016 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

(Photo by Amanda Edwards/Getty Images for Discovery Communications)

Founder, Southern Poverty Law Center, Morris Dees of “Hate in America” speaks onstage during the Discovery Communications TCA Winter 2016 at The Langham Huntington Hotel and Spa on January 7, 2016 in Pasadena, California. (Photo by Amanda Edwards/Getty Images for Discovery Communications)

Cohen took responsibility for unspecified “problems” at the SPLC in a statement released to the Montgomery Advertiser.

Cohen asked the SPLC’s board “to immediately launch a search for an interim president in order to give the organization the best chance to heal,” according to the Advertiser.

SPLC employees were long aware of racial issues and sexual harassment within the organization, former SPLC staffer Bob Moser recounted in a scathing essay published in The New Yorker on Thursday.

Moser described the SPLC as a “highly-profitable scam” that “never lived up to the values it espoused,” despite its portrayal to gullible donors.

“We were part of the con, and we knew it,” Moser wrote.

The SPLC is known to label pedestrian conservative organizations as “hate groups,” and is a key resource for Amazon, Google and other tech companies in policing “hate speech.”

The non-profit recently reported more than half a billion dollars in assets, including $121 million in off-shore funds.

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