This Week’s Column: Postgame Update

Follow-up based on reader responses

Tuesday’s Takimag column about James O’Keefe prompted a half-dozen private emails from people in the O’Keefe circle.

And those emails carried the same message, which I’ll relate without violating the confidence of those who sent them.

I won’t waste space recapping Tuesday’s piece; read it here if you haven’t already.

One thing I didn’t have room to mention in the column was that there were several aspects of O’Keefe’s “private” resignation video (you know, the “confidential” one that leaked in HD the minute he recorded it) that troubled me. Most notably, his mockery of the board’s claim that he took too many “Black cars.”

O’Keefe acted as though the board was criticizing him for the color choice of his rentals. He laughed about it. “What difference does the color make? Crazy!”

O’Keefe knows, I know, you likely know, that “Uber Black” is a specific thing, a pricey luxury car as opposed to a standard Uber.

O’Keefe’s deceptive interpretation of “black” should throw everything else he says into question.

Also, when the board claimed that he used company funds for a wedding venue, he responded with “that’s impossible! I’ve never been married!”

A reader reminded me that O’Keefe had indeed been planning a wedding, but it was called off. So the fact that he’s not married is irrelevant. Was the prospective venue reserved with company funds? That’s important, regardless of whether O’Keefe got a refund, or lost his deposit, after the cancellation.

But here’s the main point from the “inner circle” people:

There’s apparently an IRS investigation into Project Veritas’ use, or possible misuse, of funds.

This is serious business. Political fundraising (left and right) is the Wild West. It’s a dirty affair. You con old ladies, you con ghetto moms, you con gullible celebrities, you con cancer patients into changing their will.

From my early days in the ‘90s watching Willis Carto do that shit, to more recent times watching “respectable” rightists do it as well, I’ve always been aware, as you should be too, that there’s no integrity in political fundraising.

But...you can’t piss off the IRS.

You can tell a 100-year-old WWII vet that he’ll go to Hell is he doesn’t give you a thousand bucks. “Without that money the Marxists will take over and God will judge you for abandoning your nation and allowing the godless to prevail.”

You can be slippery and “creative” when raising money. To a point. And that point is, you can’t become 501(c)(3) and brazenly dare the IRS to come after you.

Especially – and here’s the key part – when you’re an org in opposition to the current regime.

If it’s true that O’Keefe was spending lavishly on himself, the board could be in serious legal trouble. As one messager pointed out, getting jacked by the IRS is a bigger deal to these people than losing followers. Because everyone’s saying, why did the Veritas board confront O’Keefe when the org was riding high? Well, you can take the conspiratorial view – “Pfizer paid them off! It’s a grand conspiracy!” – or maybe the board is worried about something that makes people so nervous they soil themselves just contemplating it.

I hate comic books and I don’t watch superhero movies, but a friend who’s into that crap once told me about a Batman comic (later adapted as a 1998 “New Batman Adventures” cartoon) in which the Joker is set up by a rival crime lord to owe millions to the IRS. And the Joker, anarchic as he is, panics, because even he is too afraid to tangle with the IRS.

The gag works because we all get it.

So if it’s true that O’Keefe’s personal spending has attracted IRS attention, then the board’s actions become explicable.

After O’Keefe vacated Veritas last week, Cerno – or was it Poso...no, it was Cerno – tweeted:

The Project Veritas Board has back channeled talking points claiming James Okeefe was missing donor funds. What a clown show. Why not ask the donors if they care that James took too many Uber black cars? This is the latest desperate effort to shape the narrative.

This is what you get when a movement becomes unmoored, untethered from reality.

Cerno is saying “if the donors are okay with misappropriation, then all’s well! Just ask the 90-year-old ladies if they’re cool with their money being used for O’Keefe’s personal expenses. I’m sure they’re fine with it, bless their hearts.”

But it doesn’t matter if the donors are okay with it. If the IRS isn’t, you have problems.

This isn’t It’s a Wonderful Life where the authorities tear up the warrant for George Bailey’s arrest because the townsfolk replace the missing funds. The crime is that the funds went missing in the first place. The account holders at the building and loan can’t say “let it go; we love George and we don’t care what happened to the money.” The misappropriation would still be prosecuted.

But guys like Cerno live in a very detached world. As do so many rightists these days.

My message is, and has consistently been, stay grounded.

And if you don’t think the possibility of trouble with the IRS is enough to panic the board of directors of a 501(c)(3), you ain’t grounded.

But man, that Cerno tweet is somethin’ else. For what it says about the right (“hey, if we cheat our donors, it’s cool as long as they like it!”), and for the more obvious point that openly saying “Project Veritas donors don’t mind if O’Keefe appropriates their money for himself” is a great way to spark an IRS investigation, even if one weren’t already initiated.

The right’s best and brightest, ladies and gents.