A former NPR fundraiser was caught harshly criticizing the Tea Party, defending the firing of Juan Williams and saying that NPR would be better off without government funding in a sting operation that caught on tape. (Watch video below.)
The sting was overseen by James O'Keefe, the conservative activist whose previous videos targeting ACORN eventually led to that organization's demise, even though the video was found to be heavily doctored.
In the video, Ron Schiller, then NPR's senior vice president for fundraising, meets with two members of a fake group that claims to be a Muslim education fund.
Schiller left NPR last week, and is due to start a job at the Aspen Institute in April. He was not involved in editorial content while at NPR. In a statement, NPR said it was "appalled" by Schiller's comments. (Read NPR's full statement below.)
Among other things, Schiller calls the Tea Party "fanatically involved in people's personal lives and very fundemental[ly] Christian—I wouldn't even call it Christian...basically, they believe in white, middle America, gun-toting—it's pretty scary. They're seriously racist, racist people."
He also defends the firing of Juan Williams. "What NPR did I'm very proud of. What NPR stood for is a non-racist, non-bigoted, straightforward telling of the news," he says.
And Schiller further says that it would be better for NPR not to receive funding from the government.
"Very little of our funding comes from the government, but they act as if all our funding comes from the government... it is very clear that in the long run we would be better off without federal funding," he says.
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