The statement explaining the termination of James O’Keefe from Project Veritas is damning for James O’Keefe on one account: O’Keefe allowed too many snowflakes to be hired at Project Veritas.
The employee rebellion that started the ball rolling toward James O’Keefe’s departure from the organization he founded reads like a farce.
The snowflakes at Project Veritas, none of whom could probably raise $5,000 if their livelihood depended on it (which now it does), put together a shocking bill of particulars why James didn’t belong at the organization he founded.
He took someone’s ham sandwich after all.
Worse, James yelled at someone once.
The snowflakes witnessed things “antithetical to our core values.”
Was the mission statement also violated? Did he offend the vision statement? How about the statement of purpose?
The snowflakes weren’t finished.
They were even “overworked” and subject to “humiliation.”
The snowflakes complained that they weren’t disposable. They didn’t get enough credit!
Memo to snowflakes: Actually, you are disposable, and will soon discover that when the funds James raised run dry.
“Diamondback” — presumably an employee — was “upset” at O’Keefe’s “treatment of staff” because he issued instructions “in a curt manner.”
The peonage at Project Veritas shocks the conscience.
Some managers were “bullied” at a “leadership team meeting,” an event “with at least ten people present[!!]”
Shiver me timbers!
“Laura” quit because she was “humiliated” because she was not fast enough at her work.
Others felt “very uneasy” at James’ aggressive promotion of the organization, and the snowflakes claimed to know why the donors “actually give” Project Veritas money, which “is to conduct undercover investigations which expose waste fraud and abuse.”
Good guess, snowflake–half right.
The reason donors give Project Veritas money is because of James O’Keefe, period.
I know this is true because there is overlap between some of the donors of Project Veritas and the organization I head.
I know why they give money to Project Veritas because I have spoken with them, and it isn’t because of that video editor who was addressed in a “curt manner” or a leadership team member who was bullied, in front of 10 people no less.
The snowflakes are going to find out what it is like to work for an organization that has no reason to support it. When James O’Keefe departed Project Veritas, Project Veritas lost its creative engine.
Related: Secret Seizure of James O’Keefe Cloud Email, Abusive DOJ Lawyers and a Vindictive Father President
The snowflakes need to understand that James built what he built for free. He did it without being paid, without worrying about team support, workplace wellness, or affirmation. He built Project Veritas on his dreams, moxie, and hard work. He took the risk. The snowflakes did not.
James got the Message to Garcia.
The donors know this. So much so that the donors have hired legal firepower to put the corporate shell on notice that spending the money James raised won’t be tolerated without James. Call it a conditional gift. They gave money to Project Veritas because of James O’Keefe. They didn’t give donations to support snowflakes.
If James was guilty of a second offense, it was having a board that didn’t know much about nonprofit law and was willing to stab James in the back.
The statement of Project Veritas alluded to fears of 501(c)(3) status being lost or failed fiduciary duties.
Balderdash.
Project Veritas had about as much chance of losing (c)(3) status as the ACLU. The expenses at the heart of the snowflakes’ complaint are not unusual for large (c)(3) heads. They can be forgiven for not knowing this, because from what I know about many of them, they don’t come from a background in the non-profit world. Some even come from the fringes.
Again, James is guilty of one thing.
And if anything is a breach of fiduciary duty, it is running off the one person who gives life, blood, and imagination to the organization. Run off James O’Keefe, and there is no Project Veritas. That’s the ultimate breach of fiduciary duty.
Even the particulars cited by the Project Veritas statement are ridiculous. James uses too many “black cars”?
Really? James must raise $60,000 a day to keep the organization running. Time is money.
James even took a private jet once and ended up going to his boat!
The scandal! Yet the Project Veritas statement doesn’t tell the whole story, does it? Call it selective editing. Where did James come from? What donor meeting was made possible by the use of the private jet? How much time did it free up?
In the end, the only reason Project Veritas exists is because of the dreams, work, and risk taking of James O’Keefe. He will rise again because he is an innovator, a pioneer, a patriot. The organization, and all the snowflakes, will eventually melt away. That’s too bad, and didn’t have to happen.
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