Project Veritas sounds harmless, right? It isn't

Started by shameless self-promoter James O'Keefe, Project Veritas sends undercover operatives with hidden cameras to try to trick people into making harmful statements. This past January, during a season of protests in New York City, O'Keefe and the Project Veritas pushed one of their employees too far and fired him when he wouldn't do their dangerous bidding.

O'Keefe, according to documents obtained by Talking Points Memo, ordered one of his employees, an American Muslim, to try and get peaceful protestors to say they'd like to kill NYPD officers. The man refused on the grounds that it violated his faith. His supervisor, who has brothers that are retired NYPD officers, also refused to follow through on it, and now claims in a lawsuit that he was fired for his refusal.

Here is Mohammed Alhomsi's account of what he was told to say:



As a minority and a Muslim, I know what it's like when the police treat me unfairly. They have even searched my little daughter's body. Can you believe that? Do you know what it's like to have your rights violated because of the color of your skin or because of your name? -PAUSE- Sometimes, I wish I could just kill some of these cops. Don't you just wish we could have one of the cops right here in the middle of our group? -PAUSE- What would you do if we could get Officer Pantoleo (who killed Eric Garner) right here in this crowd? What would you do to him?

In the current climate, with sincere tensions between police and the community, this type of action is unethical, dangerous, and indeed crosses a line, even in the era of gotcha politics.