Project Veritas

Project Veritas is an American far-right activist group founded by James O'Keefe in 2010. The group produced deceptively edited videos of its undercover operations, which use secret recordings in an effort to discredit mainstream media organizations and progressive groups. Project Veritas also used entrapment to generate bad publicity for its targets, and propagated disinformation and conspiracy theories in its videos and operations. Project Veritas's targets included Planned Parenthood, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), NPR, CNN, and The Washington Post. In 2009, Project Veritas associates published misleading videos that depicted ACORN employees providing advice on concealing illegal activity, causing ACORN to shut down after losing funding; the attorney general of California cleared ACORN of wrongdoing in 2010, and the associates paid a total of $150,000 in settlements to an ACORN employee who sued for defamation. NPR CEO Vivian Schiller resigned in 2013 after Project Veritas released a deceptively edited video portraying another NPR executive making controversial comments about the Tea Party movement and NPR's federal funding. Project Veritas unsuccessfully attempted to mislead The Washington Post into publishing false information about the Roy Moore sexual misconduct allegations in 2017; the Post won a Pulitzer Prize after uncovering the operation. In 2022, a jury awarded $120,000 against Project Veritas for fraudulent misrepresentation of the nonprofit Democracy Partners. As a non-governmental organization, Project Veritas was financed by conservative fund Donors Trust (which provided over $6.6 million from 2011 to 2019) and other supporters, including the Donald J. Trump Foundation. In 2020, The New York Times published an exposé detailing Project Veritas's use of spies recruited by Erik Prince to infiltrate "Democratic congressional campaigns, labor organizations and other groups considered hostile to the Trump agenda". The Times piece notes O'Keefe's and Prince's close links to the Trump administration, and details contributions...