Tony Ortega is a journalist who was formerly the editor of The Village Voice. He's written about Scientology since 1995, and in May 2015 released a book about Scientology's harassment of Paulette Cooper titled 'The Unbreakable Miss Lovely.' He continues to monitor breaking developments in the Scientology world from an undisclosed location in an underground bunker he shares with four cats and one of them wrinkly Shar Pei dogs. Despite his super-secret security protections, you can still reach him pretty easily by sending him a message at tonyo94 AT gmail.com (Drop him a line if you'd like to get an e-mail whenever a new story is posted.) [Header image courtesy John Rickard]
FOLLOW ME ON
Daily Notifications
Sign up for free emails to receive the feature story every morning in your inbox at tonyortega.substack.com

Categories

Monthly Archives

Scientology is a special hell for the ‘staff’ who work at your local ‘org’

 A couple of different things prompted me to come forward about my experience as an ex-Scientology Class V Org staff member. I will summarize as best I []

ADVERTISEMENT

‘We’ve talked to the FBI’ Leah Remini says in first podcast, calling for Scientology raid

 Now this was a lot of fun. Leah Remini and Mike Rinder dropped the first episode of their new weekly podcast ‘Scientology: Fair Game’ at midnight, and we eagerly devoured []

Why Scientology can worry if John Travolta and Lisa Marie Presley seek solace in each other

 Yesterday, The Daily Beast published a story written by us that looked at Kelly Preston’s involvement in Scientology. We had talked to numerous former Scientologists with firsthand knowledge about what a “hardcore” and “strict” member of the church Preston []

Scientology donor in leaked video: ‘You’re going to pay this money fucking eventually’

 Tom Cummins is one of Scientology’s top donors, having given at least $32.5 million just to the IAS, the church’s defense fund. He’s also given millions more to the various “Ideal Org” projects that replace older churches with new ones, even though there’s no evidence that Scientology is []

Paulette Cooper tells us she’s been interviewed for Leah Remini’s new Scientology podcast

[Leah with Paulette Cooper and her husband Paul Noble in 2015]

Yesterday, Leah Remini and Mike Rinder let the cat out of the bag that their new podcast would be titled ‘Scientology: Fair Game’ and would start on iHeartRadio on Tuesday.

If there’s a person we think of in relation to Scientology’s Fair Game retaliation operations, it’s []

Scientology’s antivaxx warrior Leigh Dundas unleashes another amazing Two Minutes Hate

 Antivaxx, anti-mask, and anti-slowtalking OT Scientologist attorney Leigh Dundas put on another amazing performance for the Orange County Board of Supervisors this week, this time agitating against the county re-approving its local health emergency in response to the coronavirus []

Scientologists mourn the loss of Kelly Preston, say nothing about former member Ben Keough

[Kelly Preston in a 1990 Scientology promotion]

The shocking news about Kelly Preston’s breast cancer death at 57 has led to public outpourings of grief and tributes to the actress, who was married to actor John Travolta and, like him, was a longtime and very dedicated []

New Scientology video brings up past lives, the nuttiest and most gruesome part of Hubbardism

 We have another leaked video from inside Scientology, this time from the Melbourne org. Australian musician and Scientology Volunteer Minister Rob Meister broadcast a lecture on past lives, a major aspect of Scientology’s teachings. (We previously heard from Meister when he was stranded on the Freewinds during its measles quarantine.)

L. Ron Hubbard’s 1958 book “Have []

‘Scientology Black Ops’ series with Leah Remini & Paul Haggis spiked by Aussie network

 On July 2 Australia’s 7News network teased a 10-part series titled ‘Scientology Black Ops’ that would feature journalist Bryan Seymour. []

Kelly Preston dies; Lisa Marie Presley loses son to suicide; Scientology remains useless

 We had just finished writing a story late last night about the shocking suicide death of Lisa Marie Presley’s 27-year-old son Benjamin Keough when we were blindsided by the news that Kelly Preston, 57, has died of breast cancer. We didn’t even know she was []