Heidi Beirich
Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer, Global Project Against Hate and Extremism
2021, 2022, 2023, 2025
Heidi Beirich is the Co-Founder, Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism. Beirich is also an Advisory Board Member of the Network for Hate Studies based out of the University of Ontario Institute of Technology and the former Intelligence Project Director of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) Intelligence Project, which publishes the award-winning Intelligence Report and the Hatewatch blog.
Beirich is an expert on various forms of extremism, including the white supremacist, nativist and neo-Confederate movements, as well as racism in academia.
Beirich oversaw the SPLC’s yearly count of the nation’s hate and anti-government groups, was a frequent contributor to the SPLC’s investigative reports and is an oft-sought speaker at conferences on extremism. Before joining the SPLC staff in 1999, Beirich earned a doctorate in political science from Purdue University. She is the co-editor and author of several chapters of Neo-Confederacy: A Critical Introduction.
At the Summit
The catalytic power of this Summit in bringing together those who are devoting their lives to pushing back and working to confront, understand and work towards solutions around hate in our society is a noble and difficult task. The Summit not only energized those who attended but led to connecting the dots in a global network of those doing this work. The stories of the victims of hate were painful to witness but their courage in coming forward was inspirational. Those who attended left energized with the hope that by working together solutions can be forged.
