March 2018
Book Review
AMERICAN PRAVDA: My Fight for Truth in the Era of Fake News by James O'Keefe. St. Martin's Press, January 2018. Hardcover, pp. 320. Price: $16.49. Available from Amazon.
James O’Keefe is an award-winning journalist and writer. A proud Catholic, he is the founder and President of both Project Veritas and Project Veritas Action, non-profit organisations dedicated to investigating corruption, dishonesty, waste and fraud in both public and private institutions. He is a shining example of how a young patriot of principle and courage, though faced with overwhelming opposition, can make a valuable difference.
The 34-year-old O’Keefe and his reporters go where traditional reporters dare not. Their alternative-media investigations have led directly to the passage of new legislation, federal and state investigations, congressional inquiries, the defunding of taxpayer-funded groups, resignations, firings, restrainings, arrests and disciplinary action.
O'Keefe's series of voter fraud-exposés inspired several states to reform their election laws, forced resignations in Washington, and pushed FBI and Department of Justice officials to defend themselves before federal lawmakers.
His investigation into ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), a notoriously corrupt Alinskyite group with deep ties to Alinsky-trained Community Organiser Barack Obama, led to the group’s collapse. He caused a Planned Parenthood Vice President to be fired, National Public Radio executives to be fired, an Enroll America director to be fired, Medicaid worker retrainings, and Congressional field hearings into Obamacare navigator fraud.
The Nation magazine wrote, “O’Keefe’s influence on voting rights opponents and legislators alike is particularly jarring.” Slate.com agreed, “O’Keefe has had more of an impact on the 2012 election than any other journalist.”
In 2013, O’Keefe authored New York Times bestseller, Breakthrough: Our Guerilla War to Expose Fraud and Save Democracy, the inside story of the challenges he faced bringing his powerful new form of guerilla reporting to the forefront.
In May of 2014, O’Keefe released videos at the Cannes Film Festival showing Hollywood environmentalists agreeing to take money from phony Middle Eastern oil tycoons to fund anti-fracking movies. The videos prompted a U.S. Senate investigation into the funding sources of NGOs.
During the summer of 2014, an investigation by Project Veritas transformed the discussion on national security. Dressed as Osama bin Laden, James O’Keefe crossed the Rio Grande from Mexico into the United States! In a follow-up video, Project Veritas exposed the lack of security at the northern border as an investigator dressed as an ISIS terrorist crossed Lake Erie into Cleveland. In his grilling of officials from the Department of Homeland Security, Senator John McCain referenced the investigations as proof of the failure to secure the border.
Heading into the crucial fall elections of 2014, O’Keefe launched Project Veritas Action, which launched investigations in four key Senate battleground states to expose the hypocrisy of candidates who were saying one thing to the voters and something entirely different to their close supporters. All four Senate candidates exposed by O’Keefe lost their races, some by incredibly narrow margins.
In 2015, O’Keefe oversaw the expansion of both Project Veritas and Project Veritas Action, providing the vision and direction for projects that increased the training, professionalism, and reach of both organisations. During the expansion, both organisations released consequential investigations. Most notably, Project Veritas conducted investigations of the Veterans Administration, political correctness on campus, and the corruption within the racial grievance industry. Project Veritas Action reported on multiple instances of the Hillary Clinton campaign violating state and federal campaign law.
During the 2016 election cycle, both Project Veritas and Project Veritas Action released videos exposing key Democrats not only admitting that voter fraud exists, but also showing how to successfully commit it on a massive scale. One result was that a New York City Democratic election commissioner who freely admitted and deplored the flagrant voter fraud to undercover Project Veritas reporters, was forced out of his position by Mayor de Blasio and the New York Assembly!
O’Keefe also released videos exposing how the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton worked with consultants to organise paid protesters at Trump rallies, which sometimes erupted into violence. The investigation into Democracy Partners caused two key Democratic operatives to resign, sparked a response from the White House, and caused Donald Trump to bring up the videos in the final presidential debate. O’Keefe was ultimately credited with having a significant impact on the 2016 presidential elections for his October Surprise video series.
In the Summer of 2017, O'Keefe began his American Pravda video investigation series which focused on revealing the bias and hidden motivations at mainstream media companies.
The American Pravda: CNN series exposing directives to drive a "Russia narrative" made national headlines, and was mentioned by White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders during a press briefing.
The American Pravda: New York Times series led New York Times Executive Editor Dean Baquet to call O'Keefe "despicable."
With such a consistent and powerful impact on his targets, these media 'powers' will not be best pleased with his new book offering: American Pravda: My Fight for Truth in the Era of Fake News, in which the reader is invited to go undercover with the intrepid Project Veritas journalists as they infiltrate political campaigns, unmask dishonest officials and expose voter fraud.
A rollicking adventure story on one level, the book also serves as a treatise on modern media, arguing that establishment journalists have a vested interest in keeping the powerful comfortable and the people misinformed. Through it all, O'Keefe insists that the only real difference between the American press and the Soviet state newspaper Pravda, was that the Russian people knew they were being lied to.
The book not only contests the false narratives frequently put forth by corporate media, it documents the consequences of telling the truth in a world that does not necessarily want to hear it. O’Keefe’s enemies attack with lawsuits, smear campaigns, political prosecutions, and false charges in an effort to shut down Project Veritas. For the Catholic O’Keefe, every one of these attacks is a sign of success.
American Pravda puts the myths and misconceptions surrounding O’Keefe’s activities to rest. It will make you rethink every word you hear and read in the so-called mainstream press.