Peter Brimelow, founder of VDARE, at a conference in Washington, DC, November 18, 2016. Linda Davidson/Washington Post/Getty

Peter Brimelow, founder of the vehemently anti-immigration website VDARE.com, is being persecuted.

That’s what he’s been telling followers, anyway. In a video posted on X last July, Brimelow announced his resignation and the suspension of VDARE, claiming the organization “has been murdered by New York State Attorney General Letitia James,” who “is quite obviously aiming at suppressing our speech.”

PETER BRIMELOW: Why We’ve Suspended VDARE and I’ve Resigned After 25 Years pic.twitter.com/tnWSz3L0xs

One might be forgiven for finding Brimelow’s speech odious: “Hispanics do specialize in rape, particularly of children. They’re very prone to it, compared to other groups,” he claimed, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, while speaking at a 2017 conference in reference to Donald Trump’s claim that Mexico was sending rapists across the southern border. (VDARE once sued the New York Times for defamation—unsuccessfully—for reporting, among other things, that the SPLC had designated VDARE a “hate group” based on its rhetoric and Brimelow’s ties to white nationalists.)

But the lawsuit James’ office filed on Wednesday, after more than three years of investigation and court skirmishes over the AG’s unfulfilled requests for information, doesn’t dwell on Brimelow’s ideology. Rather, it accuses him and his wife, Lydia Brimelow, along with VDARE Foundation—the tax-exempt nonprofit that has supported the website (and the couple’s legal defense fund)—of misusing charitable funds.

The lawsuit claims the Brimelows—who have been championed by Trumpworld figures including Tucker Carlson,

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