James O’Keefe is a household name and is seen as a cultural hero among conservatives.
In recent weeks, Project Veritas announced that the board asked O’Keefe to take paid leave.
But James O’Keefe just broke his silence and pushed back against the actions of Project Veritas.
James O’Keefe makes shocking speech at Project Veritas office
After weeks of speculation and rumors circulating online, the truth is finally coming out at Project Veritas.
The company was founded with the mission “to investigate and expose corruption, dishonesty, self-dealing, waste, fraud and other misconduct in both public and private institutions.”
James O’Keefe, the CEO and spokesperson for the company, is now calling out the board for going against its own standards when it decided to remove him from his post as CEO and Chairman of the board.
O’Keefe claims that Project Veritas is in violation of its own core values.
O’Keefe delivered a speech condemning the actions of the board while visiting the office on Presidents’ Day to pick up the last of his personal belongings.
He thanked those in attendance and said that it was “fitting” to be delivering the speech on a holiday dedicated to leadership in America.
O’Keefe explained for the first time in public that he no longer has a job at the company.
“I have no position here based upon what the board has done—so I’m announcing to you all that today, on Presidents’ Day, I’m packing up my personal belongings here,” he said.
O’Keefe faced unrelenting legal harassment
He described the challenges when he started the company, such as “getting handcuffed by the FBI on two separate occasions…having [his] phones confiscated and private information leaked, being placed on effective house arrest…being sued dozens of times,” and a litany of attempts to destroy him legally.
O’Keefe went on to discuss the situation that brought him to this point in a 45-minute speech that he described as being “from the heart.”
The former CEO declined to opine about the controversy and instead focused on the facts of the case.
He said that the initial explanation for his departure was alleged mistreatment of employees, but when that didn’t pan out the board moved on to accuse him of financial malfeasance.
The board saw O’Keefe’s travel expenses as an issue, but he said he always preferred to raise money from donors in person.
O’Keefe pointed to the increases in revenue under him, which started at less than $750,000 in 2012 and increased to over $22 million in 2020, a more than 2000 percent increase in less than 10 years.
The former CEO asked the rhetorical question, “What has changed in the last three weeks?”
Undercover Pfizer video led to “an unusual emergency”
“The only thing that has changed is that we broke the biggest story in our organization’s history during the last week of January in 2023,” O’Keefe said about the latest undercover work exposing Pfizer.
He said that led to “an unusual emergency” that prompted the board to reconsider his role after the video raked in over fifty-million views on social media.
The “video became a global phenomenon” and “that is the only thing that has changed,” O’Keefe claimed.
O’Keefe said this story was the death knell for his career at Project Veritas.
He presented detailed evidence, including text messages exposing one board member’s intentions.
Despite his take on the situation, there might be more to the “financial malfeasance” than O’Keefe is willing to publicly admit.
O’Keefe expenses might not add up
Project Veritas board members have made it clear that this is not a coup.
Instead, they claim it’s directly related to O’Keefe’s use of donor money.
They accused the former CEO of spending donations on “personal luxuries” and gave a few examples like when O’Keefe spent $14,000 on a private flight to go get his boat fixed.
O’Keefe also spent nearly $150,000 on car services and nearly $60,000 on a “dance event” called Project Veritas Experience.
If there’s not a solid justification for these expenses from the organization’s mission standpoint, then it will make it difficult for O’Keefe to maintain his standing that this incident is related to “the biggest story in [the] organization’s history.”
Patriot Political will keep you up-to-date on any developments to this ongoing story.
