Breakthrough by James O'Keefe

Author:James O'Keefe [O'Keefe, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Threshold Editions
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

GUERRILLAS IN THEIR MIDST

Veritas Rule #18:

Obsess over getting your subject in frame.

On February 22, 2011, a stretch limousine pulled up in front of the National Public Radio offices in the heart of Washington, D.C. Two NPR executives, Senior Vice President Ron Schiller and Betsy Liley, director of institutional giving, climbed in and headed off, as arranged, to an upscale Georgetown restaurant called Café Milano. There they were to meet two representatives from the Muslim Education Action Center (MEAC) Trust, Ibrahim Kasaam and Amir Malik, who had already arrived in their own stretch limo.

Of course, there was no MEAC, and Ibrahim and Amir were not really Ibrahim and Amir. They were, respectively, our Nigerian-American friend, Shaughn Adeleye, and “Simon Templar,” a literary pseudonym adopted by one of the undercover reporters whom I met on Facebook. We had been working on this score for months. There were a lot of wrinkles, and we were ironing them out through instant messaging:

ST: James, I checked with the NPR main office, and they require ID to enter the building for the development office.

JO: Close to the day we want to meet with him, but at a nearby posh hotel. We get him a limo and pick him up at NPR headquarters and bring him to a hotel.

ST: I just got an email back. . . . Ron Schiller might be able to do the 22nd.

JO: You can’t go into that building. Fake IDs are too dangerous, and he needs to be taken out of his official corporate zone.

ST: Lunch is good though. We can book it at a really ridiculous place, provided [you are] willing to spring for this. . . . Is there any kind of max budget for this? Lunch will run at least 300. Not sure what the limo would be.

JO: That will be fine.

What I didn’t tell Simon Templar was that the cost of all this would not be fine. I was fronting the equipment, flights, limo, and meals on my credit card. This was a seven-thousand-dollar gamble, my riskiest and most elaborate to date. Thanks to New Orleans, I’d have to do it by proxy.

ST: It’d be a huge power move if we just tell them we’d like to send our limousine to pick them up. I think lunch is the way to go. Only way to get him out of the office.

JO: Maybe that place in Georgetown, what’s it called? Milano? You’ll have a limo and five million dollars. They will dance for you.

ST: It might be good to give them money as well. . . .

JO: I am uncomfortable actually wiring them money.

ST: Why?

JO: Because we are there only to get stuff on conversation. That’s always been our only purpose.

ST: The scandal though would be these guys accepting Muslim Brotherhood money.

JO: Just trust me on this. I walked into a building and was accused of wiretapping. You cannot give them an inch. High risk, low reward.

ST: I can’t imagine what they would try to suggest we’re doing—conspiracy to finance NPR?

JO: The scandal will be in NPR’s comments.

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