Activist James O’Keefe, dressed in an Osama bin Laden costume, crossed the United States border from Mexico to show how easy it is to gain access to the country.
In a YouTube video posted Monday by O’Keefe’s organization, Project Veritas, the conservative activist was filmed crossing the Rio Grande two times, once dressed as bin Laden.
“Project Veritas has just returned from the U.S.-Mexican border,” the video’s narrator said in the opening shot. “What we discovered there should worry every American.”
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“The U.S. border patrol was nowhere in sight,” O’Keefe said as he slogged through the muddy water. “It was obvious, this border is not secure. No one was on watch. Even Osama bin Laden could cross.”
O’Keefe is known for what his website terms citizen journalism and has incited controversy by secretly recording government officials and democratic organizations.
This most recent video, which is called a Project Veritas Investigation on Border Security, included an interview with Sheriff Arvin West of Hudspeth County, Texas, standing at the end of the fence that is supposed to block the border.
“Do you think our border is secure?” O’Keefe asked West.
“You’re lookin’ at it. If you think four strands of barbed wire is securing the border, then I guess it’s secure,” West said.
While O’Keefe’s video brought criticism from many angles,
Gawker’s Adam Weinstein pointed out that another journalist did almost the same thing last month crossing the border.
Weinstein and O’Keefe got into a Twitter argument over Gawker’s article.
Gawker also poked fun at O’Keefe for asking for donations to cover his trip to the U.S.-Mexico border.
On the Project Veritas website, O’Keefe asked for $74,242 to cover “legal fees, investigators' salaries, and travel expenses.”
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