Think Again, ThinkProgress

After spawning a number of false reports that Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe had violated his probation and a federal court order by attending last weekend’s Faith and Freedom Conference in Washington, D.C., liberal blog ThinkProgress was forced to retract that claim Saturday. From TP:

“Days ago, the AP reported that a federal judge had denied [O’Keefe’s] request for permission to leave New Jersey to attend the conference… Although it’s possible the judge reconsidered his decision, there are no reports that occurred.”

Included, and presumably intended as evidence, is a photograph of O’Keefe in a suit and tie speaking openly to other conference attendees, conveniently supplied by Dave Weigel. It’s understandable that the establishment press would be confused. After all, immediately after New Orleans Magistrate Daniel Knowles III denied O’Keefe’s motion for permission to travel outside of New Jersey on May 23, someone sent a copy of that ruling to the Associated Press. O’Keefe himself learned of Knowles’ decision on the news. When the ruling was reversed (three days before ThinkProgress claimed “there are no reports that occurred”), it went unnoticed by those more interested in destroying Project Veritas than actually reporting the news.

Of course, since Magistrate Knowles did reverse his earlier ruling, O’Keefe’s appearance at the conference was perfectly legal. But that didn’t stop dozens of his enemies from flooding O’Keefe’s probation officer with calls to tattle on his whereabouts, obviously hoping to land him behind bars. It is ironic that so many alleged supporters of the First Amendment and freedom of the press want to imprison a truth-teller simply because they don’t like what he has to say.

But that’s precisely what we’ve come to expect from “journalists” like those at ThinkProgress, who seem intent on silencing any dissent from their statist narrative. They would rather see James O’Keefe in jail than on the streets slaughtering sacred government cows (like ACORN and NPR) in front of the American people. Unfortunately for them, Project Veritas will not be silenced.