(6/24/2011) - Largely unfounded and often rabid charges that smacked of
McCarthyism, led to the demise of one of the nation's staunchest supporters
of community development and fair housing.
Given the banking industry's continued betrayal of its customer base
and persistent collusion with the still largely self-regulated financial
industry, we could really use a champion like the Association of Community
Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), now.
You can bet if ACORN was alive today, it would be dug in at the corporate
headquarters of the nation's largest banks for shoving homeowners over the
cliff and then tossing boulders after them to keep them
down.
ACORN would have sent troops to Wall Street to face off against
financial giants and greedy speculators who made billions
feeding on the hopes and American Dreams of homeowners.
Known for results-oriented, boots-on-the ground, in-your-face,
confrontational indignation that brought the Ameriquest and Household International subprime
predators to their knees -- before "subprime" was a household word -- ACORN would be in our
corner right now.
Phoenix not rising
Instead, the now bankrupt ACORN finds no vindication in the release last
week of the U.S. Government Accountability Office report "ACORN:
Federal Funding and Monitoring". Like other studies the GAO report
reveals there was little to substantiate the vast majority of charges that
drove ACORN into the ground.
ACORN's admitted infractions and isolated failures were small potatoes
compared to surreptitious "Inside Job" infractions conducted by an unbridled financial infrastructure of perpetuators
responsible for spawning the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Charges against ACORN, related to voter registration fraud, voting fraud
and federal funding violations, among others, began largely after ACORN
spearheaded many efforts to register voters for the historic 2008
presidential election which catapulted Barack Obama into the role of the
nation's first African American president.
At the time, the operation was also grappling with an internal $1 million
embezzlement case it admittedly handled poorly.
During investigations into these matters, a new scandal surfaced when
"hidden camera" videos purportedly revealed ACORN volunteers and employees
offering tax advice on a proposed prostitution business.
ACORN blames
"Republicans" and "conservative activists" for leading the charge to strip
federal funding from what was perhaps the nation's largest grassroots
community organization of low- and moderate-income people, often African-Americans.
At its height, ACORN boasted nearly a half million member families
organized into more than 1,200 neighborhood chapters in about 75 cities
across the nation. For 40 years, ACORN broke down barriers of discrimination
and prejudice..
The controversy, stemming from nearly 50 federal state and local
investigations, cost ACORN and its affiliates federal funding (more than
$50 million from 2005 through 2009) and cast a shadow over its private
fund-raising efforts.
Beating the charges
ACORN was first cleared of wrong doing in 2009, by the Congressional Research Service in an investigation
requested by the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Service
Committee.
The report "CRS: Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now
(ACORN) " not only exonerated ACORN, but also questioned the
constitutionality of the legislation used to withdraw ACORN's funding.
Without due process, legislation that inflicts "attainder," a type of
punishment, could be considered unconstitutional, the report said.
The CRS report also questioned the impunity of those performing
"evidence-gathering" dirty-tricks in hidden-camera stings used to bring
additional charges.
At about the same time, U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon likewise argued
Congress violated the Constitution by illegally targeting the group and
attempted to block U.S. officials from enforcing the funding ban.
Months later, in March 2010, she upheld that order saying it was
"unmistakable that Congress determined ACORN's guilt before defunding it."
She also said Congress damaged ACORN's reputation and its ability to raise
funds in the process. Not only were federal funds cut, but major
contributors, the Ford and Mott Foundations, cut off funding to ACORN.
The Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals later disagreed with the Gershon
ruling, forcing ACORN to take its federal funding case to the Supreme
Court.
Meanwhile, by March, 2010, both Brooklyn, NY prosecutors and an
independent investigation by the California Attorney General's Office
cleared ACORN of criminal wrong doing over the hidden camera videos, after
determining the videos were heavily edited, manipulated and distorted to
meet then tricksters' agenda.
Except for millions of dollars in lost federal funding and ACORN's
demise, little proof of wrong doing has come from the dozens of
investigations.
The final ironic ACORN chapter is the latest exoneration by the GAO. The
report says:
• Of 22 investigations of alleged election and voter registration
fraud, most were closed without prosecution.
• One of eight investigations of alleged voter registration fraud
resulted in guilty pleas and seven were closed without action due to lack of
evidence.
• The Federal Election Commission (FEC) reported five closed matters
– one resolved, one dismissed and the others dropped after FEC "found no
reason to believe the violations occurred."
In March, this year, in one of the ACORN website's final blog entries by
outgoing CEO Bertha Lewis "Vindication Doesn't Pay The Bills", Lewis writes:
"ACORN has faced a series of well-orchestrated, relentless, well-funded
right wing attacks that are unprecedented since the McCarthy era. Our
effective work empowering African American and low-income voters made us a
target. The videos were a manufactured, sensational story that led to rush
to judgment and an unconstitutional act by Congress. For ACORN as a national
organization, our vindication on the facts doesn't necessarily pay the
bills. I know that ACORN's dedicated community members will continue to speak out for
justice and organize in their communities."
We can only hope.
Post mortem
On June 20, 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court refused, without comment, to review
Acorn v. U.S., the advocacy group's attempt to revive its lawsuit claiming
that Congress had acted unconstitutionally when it denied ACORN federal
funds.
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