‘Project Veritas' founder James O'Keefe speaks at SMU

Conservative activist and self-proclaimed journalist James O'Keefe spoke to students at SMU Wednesday night at a student group's invitation.

O'Keefe is known for his controversial undercover videos, but most recently for his group trying to fool the Washington Post with a woman pretending to be a Roy Moore sexual assault victim.

It was O’Keefe’s first major appearance since the Post report. He was brought to SMU by the Young Americans for Freedom, a campus conservative group, to speak before the revelations came out.

He spent an hour tonight talking about the history of ‘Project Veritas’ and his organization’s work to expose community groups like ACORN and Planned Parenthood through undercover videos.

He talked about the attention that was on him as a result of what happened this week after the Washington Post reported on Monday that O'Keefe had a woman pose as a sex assault accuser of Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore. The Post sniffed out the allegations and reported instead on his botched plot.

O'Keefe’s organization has been releasing photos online and social media and instead trying to shift the story and show Post reporters discussing their operations. During the Wednesday event, he said he wouldn't have time in his presentation to talk about the Washington Post, but it was among the first questions asked by the audience.

“I just wanted to ask given that you found during your investigative journalism that Washington Post was doing their due diligence in investigating potential accusers, are you more inclined to believe Moore's other accusers or does your opinion remain the same?” one student asked.

“I don't have an opinion on it, honestly,” O’Keefe replied. “I can’t speak intelligently about that. I can only speak intelligently about what we expose. The Washington Post seems to want a Nobel Prize for vetting a source correctly. I think the…. The mission of Project Veritas as a whole people is to keep them honest, hold them accountable, and I think we do that.”

O’Keefe says he can’t speak on investigations that don’t come to fruition.