Project Veritas Scores Major Legal Win Against New York Times, O’Keefe Responds 

Undercover journalist group Project Veritas scored a major win last week in the New York Supreme Court concerning the group’s defamation lawsuit against the newspaper.

The decision said the James O’Keefe-founded Project Veritas has sufficient evidence that the Times might have been motivated by “actual malice” and acted with “reckless disregard” in servals posts hitting the group’s work.

Jonathan Turley reported Sunday:

“This ruling means Project Veritas will now be able to put New York Times reporter Maggie Astor and New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet under oath where they will be forced to answer our questions,” O’Keefe said in reaction to the win, The Post Millennial reported Saturday.

“Project Veritas will record these depositions and expose them for the world to see,” he added.

The decision, in part, reads:

The court finds that the documentary proof and the facts alleged by Veritas are sufficient to meet its burden. The facts submitted by Veritas could indicate more than standard, garden variety media bias and support a plausible inference of actual malice. There is a substantial basis in law to proceed to permit the plaintiff to conduct discovery and to then attempt to meet its higher standard of proving liability through clear and convincing evidence of actual malice. Malice focuses on the defendant’s state of mind in relation to the truth or falsity of the published information. Here there is a substantial basis in law and fact that Defendants acted with actual malice, that is, with knowledge that the statements in the Articles were false or made with reckless disregard of whether they were false or not. Veritas alleged actual malice by providing facts sufficient to demonstrate Defendants’ alleged disregard for the truthfulness of its statements. Accordingly, at this very early stage of the litigation, Veritas’ submissions were sufficient to withstand defendants’ motions, and further proceedings are necessary to resolve the issues raised.

Turley said this latest hit for the Times follows a win from former Alaskan Republican Gov. Sarah Palin. “Having two such losses for the New York Times in the defamation area is ironic given its role in establishing the precedent under New York Times v. Sullivan,” he noted.

As the suit has been moving forward, Project Veritas has continued its reporting. On Monday, the group released revealing photos at the Southern border as the Biden administration has reportedly put what’s effectively a “gag order” on Border Patrol agents with the media, according to sources. The Biden administration has denied the gag order reports.

The Daily Wire reported:

James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas released new leaked photos from inside a border detention facility in Donna, Texas, that show hundreds of migrants sleeping on the floor with little space in between them despite the ongoing pandemic.

“These photos were taken within the last few days,” a source told Project Veritas. “There are eight pods with eight cells each in the facility. At any given moment there are an average of 3,000 people in custody here.”

“They [migrants] are separated by age or physical size depending on room,” the source said. “Fifty were COVID positive in these cells over the last few days.” O’Keefe also claims that he has received reports of “multiple sexual assaults, normal assaults and daily medical emergencies.”

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