OAN Roy Francis
11:46 AM PT – Saturday, March 4, 2023
James O’Keefe’s first public appearance since he was driven out from Project Veritas was at CPAC on Saturday morning.
While speaking from CPAC, O’Keefe said that “we need brave whistleblowers. We need people on the inside. There were people on the inside of Pfizer who helped us obtain this.”
He went on to introduce Debbie Bernal to the stage. He introduced her as the person inside Pfizer who had helped him gain the information he needed when looking into the pharmaceutical giant.
“To be a whistleblower is to step outside the great chain of being, to basically be disconnected from the mothership. That’s sort of like how I feel right now,” said O’Keefe. “But I’ve learned a lot of things over the last month, having been ousted from the company I founded 13 years ago, mere days after the story. But as this was happening, I was talking to one of these people and she was a little reluctant to go public. Rightfully so, she was scared.”
O’Keefe said he had reconnected with Bernal after the events with his company, he explained that she had also been targeted. He said that after the Pfizer story broke, Bernal was the person who “was brought into a room, interrogated, who had a red van go to her home, harass her and her loved ones, who was scared for her life.”
The former CEO said that the recent events at Project Veritas had inspired Bernal to go public with him at CPAC.
When on stage Bernal admitted to being “a little reluctant to come at first,” and that she was “scared for my life.”
“I was worried that I would end up in a body bag, or in a car accident. But I realized that the spirit of fear is not from the Lord,” Bernal said. “As a believer, I knew that I couldn’t just sit there, I couldn’t just sit there and watch. People get lied to, people get gaslit, it made me angry.”
She went on to explain that the only reason she had the courage to go public was because of O’Keefe, and she is thankful for anyone who had listened to her.
“I think we all need to learn to not be fearful. Fear is how the enemy controls us. The reason why our country is going the way it’s going is because of fear. People are willing to give up their freedom and their liberty to feel safe. We can’t do that. Freedom is not free,” she continued. “I just want to tell all the people here in this room who are employed, if you guys work for big tech, media, a government agency, it’s your responsibility to stand up. Do not let these people keep getting away with this. If you don’t say something, they’re gonna keep doing it.”
During his speech, O’Keefe outlined his investigation into Pfizer and thanked the “brave” Project Veritas journalists that worked with him to help make the story happen.
“Courage is the virtue that sustains all others, and without that you really can’t do journalism,” he said.
O’Keefe concluded his speech by telling the crowd, “I’m not stopping or giving up.”
By: OAN
