James Edward O'Keefe III is an American conservative political activist. He produces secretly recorded undercover audio and video encounters in academic, governmental, and social service organizations, purporting to show abusive or allegedly illegal behavior by employees and/or representatives of those organizations. He has selectively edited videos to misrepresent the context of the conversations and the subjects' responses, creating the false impression that people said or did things they did not.He gained national attention for his deceptively edited video recordings of workers at Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now offices in 2009, his arrest and guilty plea in 2010 for entering the federal office of then-U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu under false pretenses, and the release of misleading videos of conversations with two high-ranking, now former, NPR executives in 2011.
When his videos portraying ACORN workers seemingly aiding a couple in criminal planning hit the 24-hour cable news cycle, the U.S. Congress quickly voted to freeze funds for the non-profit. The national controversy resulted in the non-profit also losing most of its private funding before investigations of the videos concluded no illegal activity occurred. In March 2010, ACORN was close to bankruptcy and had to close or rename most of its offices. Shortly after, the California State Attorney General's Office and the US Government Accountability Office released their related investigative reports. The Attorney General's Office found that O'Keefe had misrepresented the actions of ACORN workers in California and that the workers had not broken any laws. A preliminary probe by the GAO found that ACORN had managed its federal funds appropriately. One of the fired ACORN workers sued O'Keefe for invasion of privacy; O'Keefe issued an apology and agreed to pay $100,000 in a settlement.
O'Keefe has gained support from right-wing and conservative media and interest groups. In 2009, Andrew Breitbart commissioned him for the option to publish new videos exclusively on BigGovernment.com. In June 2010, O'Keefe formed a 501 organization, Project Veritas.
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28. June 1984
