The FBI's raids on Project Veritas had the effect of protecting not just the Biden family but also The New York Times. It's yet another episode in a long history of the FBI and New York Times wildly abusing their power.
Several observers have pointed out the terrible optics and even worse legal and cultural implications of the FBI’s raids earlier this month on three undercover journalists’ homes. Since the reporters’ organization, Project Veritas, is a political opponent of the American regime, the raids echo government behavior in unfree countries such as Russia, China, and Turkey.
Yet there’s another, less remarked, aspect to this story. It’s the raids’ effect of protecting a longtime, top-tier deep state information operations partner, The New York Times.
Project Veritas is a threat to The New York Times, not only in some of its undercover reporting about Times employees but also in its lawsuit against the Times for defamation. Curiously, then, The New York Times appeared to be aware of the raids about as soon as they commenced, as well as possibly obtaining private information about Project Veritas from the FBI operation.
Project Veritas founder O’Keefe noted: “Within an hour of one of our reporter’s homes being secretly raided by the FBI, The New York Times we are currently suing for defamation contacted the Project Veritas reporter to ask for comment. We do not know how The New York Times knew about the execution of a search warrant at our reporter’s home, or the subject matter of the search warrant, as the grand jury investigation is secret.”
Four business days after O’Keefe’s apartment was ransacked by the FBI, The New York Times on Nov. 11 published information from internal Project Veritas legal documents. It’s currently not public whether The Times obtained those documents from discovery in Project Veritas’s defamation suit or from an FBI leaker (or leakers). Project Veritas lawyers say they suspect a leaker.
“We have a disturbing situation of the U.S. attorney’s office or the FBI tipping off the New York Times to each of the raids on Project Veritas current and former employees,” O’Keefe lawyer Harmeet Dhillon told Tucker Carlson the evening of Nov. 11.
The FBI currently claims the raids stem from Project Veritas viewing what is alleged to be President Joe Biden’s daughter’s diary. Last week, a judge extended a ban on the Times publishing articles about Project Veritas until at least Dec. 1, reportedly due to its publication of those internal Project Veritas documents.
The FBI’s raids on Project Veritas, then, had the effect of protecting not just the Biden family but also The New York Times. It’s yet another episode in a long and troubled history of both the FBI and New York Times wildly abusing their power.
The FBI Has Been Politicized From Its Origins
From its very beginning, the FBI was racked with abuse of power. The FBI’s own history notes that “In the early twenties, the agency was no model of efficiency. It had a growing reputation for politicized investigations. In 1923, in the midst of the Teapot Dome scandal that rocked the Harding Administration, the nation learned that Department of Justice officials had sent Bureau agents to spy on members of Congress who had opposed its policies.” Spy on members of Congress — who are supposed to control the FBI.
The infamous J. Edgar Hoover who took the helm after that scandal kept secret police files on his political opponents and used them unlawfully, including to keep multiple presidents from firing him and to manipulate U.S. senators. That’s called “blackmail.”
Things haven’t changed. The long chronicle of FBI abuse of power has only lengthened, and persists to this day. Most recently, there’s the evidence still coming out about FBI incitement and provocations related to the Jan. 6 altercations and the trumped-up...
