Two days ago, the FBI arrested activist James O’Keefe and three others for “entering federal property under false pretenses with the intent of commiting a felony” in the process of trying to wiretap Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office (D-LA). O’Keefe is infamous for dressing up as a pimp and videotaping ACORN staffers offering to help the supposed pimp and his prostitutes secure funding for a brothel.
The Salt Lake Tribune reports that the Salt Lake County GOP, which had planned to have O’Keefe host its Lincoln Day dinner, has withdrawn his invitation from the event, claiming that the speaker they chose to keynote their event does not represent them:
Salt Lake County Republicans are scrambling to line up a new keynote fundraising speaker after the arrest Tuesday of their scheduled first choice, filmmaker James O’Keefe, on charges of attempting to tamper with the phone system of a U.S. Senator.
“The allegations and arrest today certainly changes our plans,” county GOP Chairman Thomas Wright said in a telephone interview with The Tribune . “We’ll be announcing a new speaker shortly.” […]
“We’re disappointed,” he said of O’Keefe’s arrest on felony charges. “He doesn’t necessarily represent the Republican Party.”
The Salt Lake County Republicans scrubbed their website of promotional material about O’Keefe’s speech soon after announcement of his arrest. The website had noted that the Republicans planned to be inspired by O’Keefe’s work exposing “unethical behavior.” A screenshot from the cached version of the site:
Conservative politicians and right-wing media have long glorified O’Keefe, who bragged on his Twitter account that his accomplishment for the year of 2009 was getting ACORN defunded by Congress. Last month, a federal judge ruled that Congress’s singling out of ACORN for defunding was unconstitutional, successfully ending any ban on funding to the organization.
Update:
O’Keefe responded to his arrest on his Twitter account last night:
Update:
,Campus Progress’s Erin Rosa notes that Campus Reform, a right-wing organization that targets supposed left-wing political bias on college campuses, has removed references to O’Keefe from its website.