Judicial Watch: ‘NEA Propaganda Effort Grew Out of Obama Campaign’

President Obama with Yosi Sergant

Press release from Judicial Watch:

“(Washington, DC) — Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it obtained more documents from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) in response to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests related to the NEA’s controversial August 10 conference call encouraging artists to create work that promotes the Obama agenda.  The documents consist of internal NEA emails indicating the idea for the NEA propaganda effort grew out the Obama campaign while also providing new details regarding White House involvement.  The Corporation for National and Community Service, which runs the AmeriCorps program, was represented during the call.  The agencies and the White House were supposedly promoting the administration’s United We Serve political initiative.  The emails include the actual conference call invitation, which details the controversial policy agenda that was being promoted.  (The controversial call was first uncovered by www.BigGovernment.com. Other documents about the call were first released last week by Judicial Watch.) 

“The following are email excerpts:  (more…)

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Tags: Barack Obama, FOIA, Judicial Watch, nea, Obama
Posted Nov 2nd 2009 at 10:35 am in Art, Politics | 25671083 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/bighollywood/2009/11/02/judicial-watch-nea-propaganda-effort-grew-out-of-obama-campaign/Judicial+Watch%3A+%27NEA+Propaganda+Effort+Grew+Out+of+Obama+Campaign%272009-11-02+17%3A35%3A54Big+Hollywood

NEWLY UNCOVERED EMAILS REVEAL: Federal Volunteer Agency Misrepresented Involvement in White House, NEA Conference Call

Recently revealed documents obtained by Judicial Watch from the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) show a few interesting facts and supports the claims made in my earlier articles– namely, Yosi Sergant, the former NEA Communications Director, did not work alone in organizing the controversial August 10th conference call; that the White House Office of Public Engagement was fully aware of his efforts; and most importantly, that The Corporation for National and Community Service misrepresented who actually initiated the meeting.

On August 28th, Josh Miller of Foxnews.com reported “Siobhan Dugan, a spokeswoman for [The Corporation for National and Community Service], said the call was organized by an ‘individual interested’ in the group…”

This statement does not correspond with the facts.

The FOIA documents clearly show that on July 29th at 3:39pm, Nell Abernathy, a representative of The Corporation, emailed Yosi Sergant, former Communications Director of the National Endowment for the Arts, indicating that she was the person behind the content of the meeting when she stated (emphasis added):

Thanks for chatting yesterday – I’m attaching a few docs and running through what I think are my next steps.

She goes on to discuss the “Art event coordination” and provides an invite and draft of the meeting agenda to Sergant. Abernathy also states, “What is a reasonable time frame for getting together a list and recruiting some of your friends to lead?” This is in direct contradiction to the above claim by Siobhan Dugan of The Corporation. (more…)

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Tags: arts, August 10th, conference call, Corporation, emails
Posted Nov 2nd 2009 at 4:24 am in Art, Featured Story, Politics | 25645083 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/pcourrielche/2009/11/02/newly-uncovered-emails-reveal-federal-volunteer-agency-misrepresented-involvement-in-white-house-nea-conference-call/NEWLY+UNCOVERED+EMAILS+REVEAL%3A+Federal+Volunteer+Agency+Misrepresented+Involvement+in+White+House%2C+NEA+Conference+Call2009-11-02+11%3A24%3A26Patrick+Courrielche