By KELLY KULTYS
NEWS EDITOR
Self-titled community organizer, president of Project Veritas and undercover citizen journalist, James O’Keefe, spoke on Thursday to a group of students and faculty in Flom Auditorium. The presentation and Q&A, sponsored by the College Republicans, discussed O’Keefe’s work — mostly secret video recordings of different organizations — his personal career and steadfast belief that the mainstream media is biased — “corrupt,” in fact.
The 2006 Rutgers grad and New York Times best-selling author said that he isn’t a typical community organizer. “What I organize…is people like myself to have a voice to achieve power, to speak truth to power,” O’Keefe said at the event.
He said that the goal of his group, Project Veritas, is to make a difference through original reporting by getting the government and the media to react to what they are presenting. One of their main purposes, he said, is to expose lies perpetrated through society and the media.
O’Keefe showed the video that sparked his undercover journalism career – one focused on Lucky Charms. The Rutgers student at the time created a fake organization, the Irish Heritage Society, which claimed to be offended by the Irish portrayal of the leprechaun on the Lucky Charms box. O’Keefe used his first hidden camera video to flip the university’s “speech code” on them by saying this cereal portrayed offensive stereotypes.
O’Keefe continued this “undercover strategy” into his more well known videos, such as his coverage of the ACORN scandal.
Hannah Giles, who had the idea in the first place, contacted O’Keefe via Facebook in 2009. The pair decided to dress up like a prostitute and a pimp and visit various ACORN holdings in Baltimore, D.C. and New York, among others. After divulging many details about their undercover identities — such as the fact that she was a prostitute and that they had 13 illegal underage girls working for them — Giles and O’Keefe were told by the workers to cover up those details or to rename the term prostitute to “performance artist.”
These videos went viral, especially because as O’Keefe said, he released them one at a time, because many prominent news organizations claimed at first that they happened to go to a singular ACORN site and catch the workers off-guard. O’Keefe said that to make sure this wasn’t the case, he released them one day at a time.
His work was aired on all major news networks and even featured on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The White House had a strong reaction, and Congress ended up signing legislation to take away ACORN’s money after the incriminating videos were released.
O’Keefe also showed his undercover phone calls with Planned Parenthood, which also gained national attention. He posed as a “concerned parent” who wanted to specifically bookmark his donation to go to the abortion of African American children since his “child” was facing problems when applying to colleges due to affirmative action. The Planned Parenthood representative consistently said “absolutely” and that she was “excited to receive his donation.”
Other undercover videos that O’Keefe presented included his investigation into National Public Radio, in particular senior executive Ron Schiller. One of his partners posed as a Muslim brotherhood member who wanted to donate to NPR. The executive, Schiller, was caught on camera disparaging Jews, the Tea Party and “while middle American gun-toting racists.”
O’Keefe also showed another elaborate costume portrayal when he and one of his partners dressed up as Russian drug dealers who applied for Medicaid for their “sick father.” Some of the advice they received was to not mention their expensive car, because that might negatively impact their chances of receiving benefits.
One of the last videos he showed was the hidden camera video of voter polls where he and his group members attempted to commit voter fraud. One of his Caucasian partners posed as Eric Holder, the first African-American man to hold the position of Attorney General. O’Keefe’s partner was offered Holder’s ballot without even needing proper ID.
Then O’Keefe opened up for questions from the audience.
Michael Bilotti, FCRH’ 15 and president of the College Democrats asked O’Keefe if he should be considered a criminal since he was arrested for entering a federal building with a camera under false pretenses. The charge was reduced to a misdemeanor afterward, but according to O’Keefe, the judge destroyed his camera, so he could not show that he presented his actual driver’s license when entering.
Another student asked why it took people, such as O’Keefe and other undercover citizen journalists to expose these stories instead of the “mainstream media.” O’Keefe responded that many journalists fear the lawsuits against them and the invasion of privacy claims he receives regularly.
O’Keefe also believes that politics and allegiances play a huge factor into media coverage.
“To do what I do, you have to be outside the establishment and operate as a true outsider,” O’Keefe said.
O’Keefe believes many journalists have sold their integrity for access to the powerful individuals in society.
“You can’t do what I do and get drunk with Vanity Fair,” he said.
O’Keefe has also been notoriously known for denying interviews with news outlets. He said that by depriving the media of an interview with him, they can focus on the video and what it’s exposing, instead of him.
One student asked O’Keefe’s opinion of Edward Snowden, the NSA contractor who released classified details including that fact the NSA was spying on Americans’ email communications.
“Part of me thinks he’s a hero,” he said. O’Keefe also said that it’s disheartening to see the mainstream media focusing “90 percent of their attention on him,” and not discussing the issues he exposed.
Another student challenged O’Keefe about the legitimacy of his reporting since he deceives the people he is apparently exposing by wearing costumes and assuming false identities. O’Keefe responded by asking how he was different than other journalist — such Diane Sawyer of ABC who famously posed as a grocery store employee to do a story on rotting meat.
He mentioned award-winning show; NBC’s To Catch a Predator, as another example as well as CBS’s Mike Wallace.
O’Keefe asked how come they get the awards and he gets criticism, for as he said showing the truth through his undercover videos.
O’Keefe hinted that these videos he showed were just the beginning. Project Veritas is working on another “big project” that should be released in the upcoming weeks, O’Keefe said before signing some copies of his book for students.
