James O’Keefe Claims ‘Kicked Out’ of ACORN Documentary Premiere at Tribeca Fest

JamesOKeefeACORNDoc
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Jerome Hudson

Investigative journalist James O’Keefe claims he was “kicked out” of the premiere of ACORN and the Firestorm at the Tribeca Film Festival.

“They just kicked me out of the movie that is about me at the TriBeCa film festival. I had a ticket,” O’Keefe tweeted Sunday evening.

The Project Veritas president was attending the world premiere of a documentary that explores how the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) and its nearly half million leftist activists helped elect Barack Obama president in 2008.

The film details how sting videos spearheaded by Andrew Breitbart and starring O’Keefe and Hannah Giles, exposed the organization’s government-funded left-wing political activity.

O’Keefe described a hostile scene outside the Cinepolis Chelsea 6, alleging that bodyguards were ordered to bar him from the premiere.

“Situation developing outside TriBeCa film festival. Bodyguards were told not let me in. People were screaming and cursing at me everywhere,” he tweeted.

O’Keefe, who appears briefly in the political documentary, has criticized the film.

“We passed these flyers out to correct the lies in @ReubenAtlas movie. I’ve never seen such hate up close and personal,” O’Keefe wrote in a Twitter post late Sunday.

The documentary’s co-director Reuben Atlas, however, says his attempts to interview O’Keefe for the documentary ultimately failed, resulting in his “small part in the film.”

“We reached out to Mr. O’Keefe to request an interview a number of times over a few years. He never said no, but he also never got back to us,” Atlas said. “Because he chose not to participate, he ended having only a small part in the film. So I was surprised to hear that he showed up to the world premiere tonight and wanted to be involved. I heard he was filming and passing out flyers.”

O’Keefe later accused Atlas of spreading “fake news” in his claim that he was “surprised” that O’Keefe showed up to the premiere.

“Since @THR h/t @DRUDGE said director @ReubenAtlas was surprised to see @JamesOKeefeIII at #Tribeca2017, here is rest of the story #FakeNews,” he tweeted along with what appears to be an email exchange between Atlas and Nicholas Evangelista, Project Veritas assistant media director, with a subject line: “Can we get a seat for James O’Keefe at your premiere?”

 

Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson

COMMENTS

Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.