Project Veritas caught up in probe of Biden daughter’s stolen diary: report

The conservative group Project Veritas appears to be caught up in an investigation that federal authorities are conducting regarding a diary stolen from President Biden’s daughter, Ashley Biden.

The New York Times, citing two people briefed on the unfolding events, reported Friday that agents went to the town of Mamaroneck in Westchester County as well as a location in New York City to conduct two court-ordered searches on Thursday.

The areas were tied to people who worked with Project Veritas and the group’s founder and CEO, James O’Keefe, the Times reported.

The agents “performed law enforcement activity related to an ongoing investigation” at both places, a spokesperson for the FBI in New York told the newspaper. The spokesperson declined to comment further, and a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan declined to comment to the Times.

The FBI’s New York division told The Hill that it had no specific comment on the report. The Hill has also reached out to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.

The Times reported that authorities are conducting an investigation into Ashley Biden’s diary, which surfaced online days before the November 2020 election. Project Veritas did not publish the diary, but a website owned by a company called Flyover Media did, according to the newspaper.

O’Keefe acknowledged in a video released Friday that federal authorities had executed search warrants at locations tied to Project Veritas personnel, but denied any wrongdoing by the group.

He asserted that the group had been contacted by tipsters last year who claimed they had a copy of Ashley Biden’s diary with information on then-candidate Joe Biden.

O’Keefe stated that his group decided against publishing the diary because they could not confirm its authenticity. He also claimed they tried to give it back to an attorney for Biden, and that they later gave it to law enforcement.

“The FBI took materials of current and former Veritas journalists despite the fact that our legal team previously contacted the Department of Justice and voluntarily conveyed unassailable facts that demonstrate Project Veritas’ lack of involvement in criminal activity and/or criminal intent,” O’Keefe said in the video. 

The New York Times is in the midst of a libel lawsuit filed by Project Veritas regarding a story published last year covering a video that included allegations of voter fraud.