Should ACORN Be Receiving Your Tax Dollars?

Posted by Andrew Riley on Oct 6th, 2008 • 134 Clicks

The recently passed 700 Billion Dollar bailout bill which President Bush signed into law on October 3rd, didn”t earmark money directly to ACORN, but ACORN is still likely to end up with a large chunk of taxpayer money as a result.

James Terry, Chief Public Advocate, Consumers Rights League (CRL):

“Even with the removal of the ACORN provision from the current compromise bill, ACORN will still reap a windfall from this financial crisis. The first bailout bill passed a few weeks ago is already pumping what will eventually be billions of dollars into a slush fund to benefit organizations like ACORN and its affiliate, the ACORN Housing Council (AHC). [Market Watch]

So what’’s the big deal? ACORN is just a group committed to social and economic justice, right?

Satirical Photo

Since 1970, ACORN has been building community organizations that are committed to social and economic justice, and won victories on thousands of issues of concern to our members, through direct action, negotiation, legislative advocacy and voter participation. ACORN helps those who have historically been locked out become powerful players in our democratic system. [ACORN Website]

That sounds pretty good. What could be wrong with an organization that is committed to social justice? Well, let’’s have a look…

Volunteers register county jail inmates to vote

Joni Rabinowitz, a volunteer with Just Harvest, began fielding questions from the red uniformed men she later described as “extremely interested and very eager to participate.”

She was there with about 45 others from groups including the Pennsylvania League of Young Voters; Goodwill of Southwestern Pennsylvania; the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, ACORN; the Community Voters Project; Work for Progress; and Duquesne University nursing and political science students.

Volunteers explained: You can vote if you”ve been charged with a felony but haven”t had your court date yet. You can vote if you”re incarcerated on a misdemeanor conviction. You can vote if you”ve completed your incarceration on felony counts and are in jail awaiting trial on other charges. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]

Stopping by the local jail to register felons to vote. Make up your own mind on that one.

Felons paid to register Wisconsin voters

At least seven felons convicted of crimes including cocaine possession and robbery were recruited by a liberal group to register voters in Milwaukee.

The Republican Party says using convicted felons for that work increases the chances of voter fraud.

All seven were designated as special registration deputies in Milwaukee, which allows them to solicit and keep voter registration applications.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, hired all seven.

State law says anyone who is able to vote can be a special registration deputy. Felons can vote as long as they are no longer on probation or parole.

But the attorney for the state board that runs elections issued an opinion in April saying felons may not serve as special registration deputies. [NBC26 Green Bay]

So ACORN is hiring convicted felons to register voters despite the state election board saying that felons may not serve in that capacity. Is it illegal? I suspect that it might not be technically illegal, but at the very least it shows poor judgement on the part of ACORN. And it gets worse…

Fraudulent voter registration applications in Indiana

Lake County election workers discovered dozens of ACORN-delivered registration forms they believe contain inaccurate voter information, including one in which a dead man from Gary was listed as the applicant. None of those applications was processed. [Post-Trib]

I”m sure it could happen to anyone. After all, the fraudulent voter registration forms look so much like the valid voter registration forms, and they were all stacked right there next to each other. It would be interesting to know how many dead guys show up to vote and discover they”re not registered.

And it gets worse…

80 Voter registrations under investigation for fraud in N. Carolina

A Durham official is asking state elections administrators to check approximately 80 voter registration forms for possible fraud.

Mike Ashe, Durham County’’s elections director, said the forms were among about 4,000 submitted to his office over the past four to six weeks by a national left-wing group called Acorn, for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.

“They will be turned over to the State Board of Elections for investigation and prosecution,” Ashe said of the questionable documents. [Herald Sun]

Signing another person’’s name on a voter registration form can result in up to 15 months in prison in North Carolina. With any luck, someone is going to jail over this one.

Working with the Communist Party

This is from the Communist Party USA website.

Remember the president of NY NOW telling us she wanted to see lots of red flags at the March for Women’s Lives. And the chair of ACORN and Working Families Party who called upon us as family to make our contribution known. Did we respond? YES, we responded!

Across the country, we rolled up our sleeves, in swing states and so-called safe states. In voter registration drives, local races and Congressional battlegrounds. Walking precincts and working phone banks out of union halls. In presidential battleground states from Ohio, Missouri, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin to Minnesota and New Hampshire, our folks were quickly tapped to help lead the work. [CPUSA]

Should Taxpayer Dollars Be Going To Fund ACORN?

I”ve shown you a few stories, and if that’’s all there were it might not be such a big deal. But there are so many more. When you take a look at all the news stories about ACORN there are too many reports of fraud and corruption to simply discount them as anecdotal.

I don”t believe it would be fair to characterize every member of ACORN as being part of a conspiracy to commit voter registration fraud. In an organization boasting 400,000 “member families”, the vast majority of people associated with ACORN are probably good folks who want to do something positive for their communities. The problem is that there are far too many incidences of fraud and corruption for the federal government to even consider allowing our tax dollars to go to ACORN.

Given the current state of ACORN, I don”t think it would be possible for them to reform their organization and lose the bad reputation they have allowed themselves to develop. Based on all the information out there, ACORN should absolutely not be benefiting from our tax money in any way. I encourage you to do your own searches and make up your own mind about ACORN.

EXTRA: For The Truly Dedicated, A Few ACORN Related Video Clips

ACORN not paying workers, telling them to shill for Claire McCaskill.

ACORN vote fraud in Kansas City, St. Louis (Fox News)

ACORN hires Child Rapist, Thieves and Drug Dealers (KRQE Albuquerque)

Also in Albuquerque, ACORN registers 13-year old to vote (KRQE Albuquerque)

Again in Albuquerque, Drug raid uncovers ACORN vote fraud (KOAT Albuquerque)

ACORN Submitting False Registrations in Connecticut

ACORN Submits 1800 voter cards in Washington State, 1794 of them are fraudulent (Fox News)

Obama’’s ACORN connection (Fox News)

Andrew Riley is an idealist, a dreamer, and occasionally a real son-of-a-bitch. He spends his days webmastering this blog, writing for this blog, and more importantly filling his four year old son's head with silly nonsense. He is an Army veteran, a conservative Libertarian, and gets bored with most people pretty quickly. 4 out of 5 dentists agree that he is way cooler than you.
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Comments »

Sara

on October 6th, 2008 at 4:53 pm:

nNational Review Online has a story titled, “Inside Obama’s Acorn” that details Obama’s involvement with these crazies. An excerpt:nnThis is a story we’ve largely missed. While Obama’s Acorn connection has not gone entirely unreported, its depth, extent, and significance have been poorly understood. Typically, media background pieces note that, on behalf of Acorn, Obama and a team of Chicago attorneys won a 1995 suit forcing the state of Illinois to implement the federal “motor-voter” bill. In fact, Obama’s Acorn connection is far more extensive. In the few stories where Obama’s role as an Acorn “leadership trainer” is noted, or his seats on the boards of foundations that may have supported Acorn are discussed, there is little follow-up. Even these more extensive reports miss many aspects of Obama’s ties to Acorn.nn nnAnd-nnImportant as these questions of funding and partisanship are, the larger point is that Obama’s ties to Acorn — arguably the most politically radical large-scale activist group in the country — are wide, deep, and longstanding. If Acorn is adept at creating a non-partisan, inside-game veneer for what is in fact an intensely radical, leftist, and politically partisan reality, so is Obama himself. This is hardly a coincidence: Obama helped train Acorn’s leaders in how to play this game. For the most part, Obama seems to have favored the political-insider strategy, yet it’s clear that he knew how to play the in-your-face “direct action” game as well. And surely during his many years of close association with Acorn, Obama had to know what the group was all about.nnIt’s somewhat long, but worth reading.

Pop Riley

on October 6th, 2008 at 6:25 pm:

I have been getting calls from the obama campaign using CFC phones.nnCombined Federal Campaign.

Set up to take donations for emergencys such as Katrina nad IKE (Federal Phones, paid for by Federal dollars)nnGot a call from a polster????? then minutes later got a call Obama campaign wanting to change my vote.

Extremly obvious.

Got an autodialer call today telling me McCains health plan would cost 7.5 trillion dollars.

Everything i get from them is lies

Andrew

on October 6th, 2008 at 9:43 pm:

I wish the McCain campaign would stop screwing around and start talking about Ayers, and Obama’s Racist church, and ACORN, and that he said wished he wasn’t half white. There’s plenty of dirt - good honest dirt too. Why aren’t they using it?

All American Blogger » Nevada ACORN Office Raided on October 7th, 2008 at 2:24 pm:

[...] makes a nice follow up to yesterday’s story about ACORN. Nevada state authorities are raiding the Las Vegas headquarters of an organization that works to [...]

Ryan

on October 7th, 2008 at 3:51 pm:

Well you have clearly shown that ACORN has not done the best at legite voter registration, but what about the rest of the organization? What programs will the money from the bailout be funding within ACORN? I haven’t heard of tax dollars being spent to fund voter registration. Is there a direct link between the bailout money and voter registration? Because there are many programs within ACORN, that are the primary focus of the group, that seem like they would make a lot more sense to fund with the bailout money. For instance there campaigns for affordable housing, fair housing, foreclosures, gulf coast recovery, and fair tax laws. These seem like programs that would directly work at the ills of our current economic crisis. Is there evidence that the entire ACORN organization is corrupt or just voting registration?

Because if it was just the voter registration part then it seems very unlikely that Obama would have had any communication with this part of the organization. Because ACORN rarely even has community organizers working on voter registration. So could you just clarify a little bit more?

And just a random side thought. Why if you want the libertarian movement to take over America would you support any part of this bailout? It seems like wall street socialism. Just a thought correct me if I am wrong.

Andrew Riley

on October 7th, 2008 at 5:28 pm:

You’re correct about the bailout being nothing more than socialism. I certainly don’t support the bailout. I definitely don’t think any federal tas money should be funding anything other than the military, the border patrol, and the state department.

Sara

on October 8th, 2008 at 9:43 am:

None of the authors here supported the bailout. I believe what Andrew was saying, was that the government has acted against the will of the people in passing the bailout, and not only did the act against the will of the people, they have given the money they are stealing from us to people who have shown a propensity for fraud. When stated that way, it almost seems reasonable- of course, stolen money should go to crooks; that’s the way it always works, isn’t it?