D’Souza is arguably the most successful writer of Indian origin in the US.
By The American Bazaar Staff
NEW YORK: The New York Times bestselling author and top documentary filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza, 53, has sought probation and community service from a federal judge after pleading guilty to a campaign finance law violation.
In a Wednesday court filing, D’Souza’s lawyers said their client will present himself as a “disgraced and humiliated man” who acted out of character by having two “straw donors” donate $10,000 each to his friend Wendy Long’s unsuccessful 2012 U.S. Senate campaign in New York, and then reimbursing them, reported the Daily News.
U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan will impose sentence at a September 23 hearing. D’Souza faces up to two years in prison. Federal prosecutors have until September 8 to make their sentencing recommendation.
D’Souza said the means he chose to help Long, a Republican he had known since both attended Dartmouth College, was “completely aberrant,” and has led to his credibility as a public figure to be called into question. He added there was “zero chance” he would commit the crime again.
“I cannot believe how stupid I was, how careless, and how irresponsible,” D’Souza wrote. “I took a short-cut, knowing that there was a campaign limit and trying to get around the limit,” he continued. “This should not have happened, and I am ashamed and contrite that it did.”
The Mumbai-born D’Souza, who became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1991, proposed community service that could involve teaching, instructing new immigrants in English, or working at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater San Diego.
D’Souza wrote the 2010 bestseller “The Roots of Obama’s Rage” and co-directed “2016: Obama’s America,” a 2012 film that expressed concern about the country’s future if Obama were re-elected. More recently, D’Souza published “America: Imagine a World Without Her” in June and soon after released a companion movie.
The book was No. 1 on the New York Times’ hardcover nonfiction best seller list for the week ended August 31. It is No. 3 for the week ending September 7, said the News.
His first book, Illiberal Education (1991), publicized the phenomenon of political correctness in America’s colleges and universities and became a New York Times bestseller for 15 weeks. It has been listed as one of the most influential books of the 1990s. In all, he has written 16 books, most of which have done well, with surging readership.
Townhall reported that D’Souza, whom some have deemed the “Michael Moore of the right,” is launching a college tour this fall to introduce and discuss with students the documentary, “America: Imagine a World Without Her.” The film challenges the notion that America is a “predatory colonial power” that relied on thievery and exploitation to earn its prominent place in the world.
D’Souza has been in the news recently for making controversial statements also, one of which The Daily Beast pointed out recently was his interview with the conservative Newsmax TV, where he offered his opinion on the unrest in Ferguson, following the killing by police of an unarmed, black teenager. He said to the effect that protesters in Ferguson are like ISIS in Iraq.
“The common thread between ISIS and what’s going on in Ferguson is you have these people who basically believe that to correct perceived injustice, it’s perfectly okay to inflict all types of new injustices. Behead guys who had nothing to do with it. Go and loot shops from business owners who were not part of the original problem whatsoever. And all of this is then licensed by the left and licensed, to some degree, by the media,” said D’Souza in that interview.
D’Souza, a former policy analyst in the Reagan White House, also served as John M. Olin Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and the Robert and Karen Rishwain Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He served as the president of The King’s College in New York City from 2010 to 2012. He relinquished that position when claims became public that he had stayed in a hotel with a new girlfriend though not yet divorced from his wife.
D’Souza came to the U.S. as an exchange student from Mumbai and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Dartmouth College in 1983.
1 Comment
Need to cut the guy a break. Sure he broke the law and admitted to it. Give him a fine and probation and lets move on.