Rachel Maddow followed up on her interview with FAIR (Federation for American Immigration Reform) President Dan Stein and did some fact checking on the claims he made. As I noted they already started doing that at her blog the night of the interview.
They updated their post with the information she reported in this segment here -- Revised: Record contradicts Dan Stein:
Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, wants you to believe his group never gave money to Protect Arizona Now, and especially not when self-proclaimed "ethnic separatist" Virginia Abernethy was a top official. Asked about reports that FAIR had contributed to Protect Arizona Now, Stein told us last night:
"First of all, we never gave that organization a dime. And secondly, even if we were going to give them a dime, we wouldn't have given them a dime with Virginia Abernethy associated with it."
Let's go to the record. An account from the Chicago-based Center for New Community notes Abernethy's appointment was announced on July 26, 2004. By August, it was making headlines in Arizona. The Arizona Secretary of State records a contribution to PAN of $50,000 from FAIR and another $50,000 from the FAIR Congressional Task Force on April 1, 2004. The next month, on May 11, FAIR gave Pan another $25,500 -- and the FAIR Congressional Task Force gave PAN $25,000. The next month, on June 11, FAIR gave PAN $50,000 and its Congressional Task Force gave $55,000. Read on...