(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) The former FBI agent and Pentagon contractor whose anti-Trump bias was exposed in undercover footage by James O’Keefe is now suing for defamation.
Jamie Mannina claims in a federal civil lawsuit against O’Keefe that his remarks were “manipulated” and published online to suggest he was plotting a coup against President Donald Trump. He filed the lawsuit on Wednesday.
Mannina does not deny making the statements, which were all captured on video. Instead, he contends that O’Keefe and an undercover journalist identified only as “Heidi” allegedly “conspired” for the purpose of “entrapping him into making inflammatory and damaging remarks.”
Mannina admitted on video that he had teamed up with a “couple of retired generals to explore what we can do.” O’Keefe said these comments appear to refer to efforts to block Trump’s return to the White House.
“I’ve been in conversation with a couple of retired generals to explore what we can do,” Jamie Mannina, advisor to the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon, former FBI Special Agent, and self-proclaimed “spy hunter,” disclosed to an undercover OMG Journalist his plans to utilize…
— James O'Keefe (@JamesOKeefeIII) January 15, 2025
Mannina’s LinkedIn profile reveals a long career with the government, beginning with none other than Hillary Clinton, the twice-failed presidential candidate. He worked for her when she was a senator.
He followed her to the State Department in 2009, first serving as a special assistant and ultimately becoming a senior foreign affairs advisor. He then moved on to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the FBI and eventually to the government contractor giant Booz Allen Hamilton.
Mannina confessed to feeling “depressed” after Trump won the 2024 election and claimed the election cost him a major job opportunity he would have received had Trump’s opponent, former Vice President Kamala Harris, become president.
Now, Mannina wants a judge to find O’Keefe and others liable for damages over the comments he made himself. He is seeking the profits made by the video, along with punitive damages and even attorney’s fees.
He described the defamation as “deliberate” and “outrageous.” Notably, Mannina is represented by attorney Mark Zaid, the same man whose security clearance Trump revoked and who is now suing over it.
O’Keefe rebuked the lawsuit as an attempt to chill his First Amendment rights. “He said what he said. We did not take him out of context. The words that we reported came out of his mouth,” O’Keefe told the leftist Associated Press. “We stand by our reporting.”
In a post on his website, O’Keefe added: “They’re arguing that we made a defamation by implication, but we just quoted this man and reported the words that came out of his mouth.”
