James O'Keefe, a self-described “guerilla journalist” who some have likened to the late Mike Wallace of "60 Minutes" fame, described his work exposing wrongdoing among powerful companies as part of a battle between “good and evil.”
O’Keefe, the founder of Project Veritas who was forced to resign from the nonprofit after a prolonged conflict with the organization’s board of directors, addressed attendees at this year's Conservative Political Action Conference, an annual gathering of conservative activists and politicians held at the Gaylord National Hotel and Convention Center outside Washington, D.C. In his speech Saturday, O’Keefe homed in on his recent expose of the pharmaceutical company Pfizer.
For the last decade, O'Keefe said he's had the ability to carry out investigative operations, partly because he's never accepted advertising dollars to support his work.
“I’ve never taken advertising dollars” and “no one’s ever told me what to do. No one’s ever told me what not to do,” he said, adding that this fact alone has given him the ability to “expose anybody who needs to be exposed because that’s what journalism is supposed to do: show you the facts, without fear or favor.”
He highlighted how the corporate media relies on Pfizer for advertising dollars and suggested that the business relationship between the company and news organizations prevents mainstream media journalists from conducting investigations into the corporation. O’Keefe played a montage network and cable...
This story is the second in an ongoing series on the Cost of Fraud, as Open the Books tallies the hidden fees on American tax returns. Click here to read the first story on fraudulent autism billi...