by WorldTribune Staff, February 23, 2017
James O’Keefe has invited citizen journalists to help deploy his Project Vertias cameras “inside the newsrooms” of America.
O’Keefer also announced he will give $10,000 to anyone who brings him evidence of “corruption, malfeasance and wrongdoing” in the press.
“If you have hidden audio recordings, videotapes or documents inside of a newsroom or media institution, and the material is good enough, I will pay you $10,000,” O’Keefe said on Feb. 23.
The announcement of the award coincided with the first release of the “CNN Tapes” project, for which Project Veritas is uploading 119 hours of audio recordings taken by an anonymous source within the cable network’s Atlanta headquarters, according to a report by The Washington Times.
The audio, which is from 2009, features behind-the-scenes discussions between reporters, producers and other CNN employees.
Project Veritas says the audio contains evidence that CNN endorses a progressive view of journalistic ethics. It also accuses CNN of knowingly misrepresenting polling data in at least one case.
O’Keefe said in a telephone interview with CNN on Feb. 22 that he drew inspiration from WikiLeaks’ document dumps.
Asked why CNN is one of his targets, he said, “My audience, the American people, are deeply upset at the media.” He cited President Trump’s critiques of “fake news.”
“We think our media needs to be held to account, and CNN is kind of the leader of that. CNN has a very important role as an arbiter of news,” he said.
Beyond just CNN, “the media is a huge target of mine right now,” O’Keefe said.
Last month O’Keefe said at a party for Trump supporters that he had spies “embedded in your institutions. We are inside the newsrooms, and that is going to be our next target.”
Given the volume of footage to be released, O’Keefe is asking for help to transcribe and investigate the recordings and encourages users to provide tips on interesting discoveries here.