Archive for the ‘Acorn’ Category

Justice Department coordinates suits with ACORN’s Project Vote
By: Examiner Editorial | 01/19/12 8:05 PM

Steve Kest, Executive Director of ACORN, talks to a reporter after a news conference October 29, 2008 in Washington DC.(Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
Remember ACORN, the far-left activist community organizing group that filed for bankruptcy a couple of years ago? That followed revelations that some members were advising pimps and prostitutes on tax evasion, not to mention operating houses of prostitution and smuggling underage girls into the country to work in the sex industry. The Democratic-dominated Congress voted in 2009 to ban ACORN from receiving federal funds. After ACORN’s bankruptcy filing, many of its local chapters remained intact by the simple expedient of reorganizing under different names. It’s the same tactic used by fly-by-night rug merchants and disreputable used car dealers to stay one step ahead of the law.
Readers will also recall that ACORN activists have long been involved in voter registration fraud, either directly or through its Project Vote affiliate. At least 70 ACORN/Project Vote employees have been convicted of voter registration fraud in a dozen states since 2006. According to a 2009 House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform report, approximately a third of the 1.2 million new registrations turned in by the two groups in 2008 were fraudulent.

Despite all this, documents obtained recently by Judicial Watch via the Freedom of Information Act suggest that President Obama — who was employed by Project Vote as a community organizer early in his career — and Attorney General Eric Holder have no qualms about working closely with present and former ACORN and Project Vote operatives on voter registration drives aimed at people on public assistance. Take, for example, an April 2009 letter to deputy assistant attorney general Sam Hirsh from former ACORN attorney and current Project Vote director of advocacy Estelle Rogers. She described preparations for a subsequent meeting about Department of Justice plans concerning National Voter Registration Act litigation in states deemed not being sufficiently aggressive in registering public assistance recipients.

Among those to be included in the meeting, according to the Rogers letter, were Nicole Kovite, director of the public agency project for Project Vote; Spencer Overton, deputy assistant attorney general for legal policy; Cecilia Munoz, then-director of intergovernmental affairs in the Obama White House; and Tino Cuellar, special assistant to the president for justice and regulatory policy. Munoz was recently promoted to chief domestic advisor to Obama.

Other letters obtained by Judicial Watch from Rogers to high-ranking Justice Department officials include a March 2011 missive to associate attorney general Thomas Perrelli, about a document she forwarded to him “for improvement” after a previous meeting on NVRA litigation. The letters also show that during the 2010 election cycle Project Vote used the threat of NVRA suits by the DOJ to pressure officials in Missouri, Ohio, Indiana, Georgia and New Mexico to change policies and procedures to facilitate voter registration among public assistance recipients. Federal NVRA suits were filed last year by the DOJ against Rhode Island and Louisiana after officials there balked at changing their registration policies and procedures.

Given ACORN/Project Vote’s extensive links to voter registration fraud schemes across the country, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa of California might want to ask Holder about these matters on Feb. 2 when the attorney general appears before the panel.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/editorials/2012/01/justice-department-coordinates-suits-acorns-project-vote/2115286#ixzz1kHrADhf7

With the 2012 elections just months away, the ACORN-connected group Project Vote (and Obama campaign ally) is redoubling its efforts to undermine the integrity of the 2012 elections – and they are evidently doing it with the participation of the Obama White House and the Department of Justice (DOJ).
With the 2012 elections just months away, the ACORN-connected group Project Vote (and Obama campaign ally) is redoubling its efforts to undermine the integrity of the 2012 elections – and they are evidently doing it with the participation of the Obama White House and the Department of Justice (DOJ).

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In January, Judicial Watch obtained additional documents about meetings held between Estelle Rogers, Director of Advocacy for the ACORN organization Project Vote, and officials from the Obama White House and the DOJ.

Judicial Watch is investigating the extent to which Project Vote, which once employed Barack Obama, has been working with the Obama administration to use voter registration laws to register greater numbers of low-income voters, widely considered to be an important voting demographic for the Obama presidential campaign.

Judicial Watch was already well aware that the DOJ was heavily involved in this scheme based on documents·previously obtained, but the latest batch of records implicates the Obama White House directly!

According to the records, obtained by Judicial Watch in response to a FOIA lawsuit filed on August 19, 2011:

On April 27, 2009, Estelle Rogers·wrote to Deputy Assistant Attorney General Sam Hirsh regarding an upcoming meeting on April 30, 2009. In addition to Rogers and Hirsh, other attendees included: Nicole Kovite, Director of Public Agency Project for Project Vote; Spencer Overton, Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Policy; and two officials from the Obama White House: Celia Muñoz, then-Director of Intergovernmental Affairs and recently promoted to Director of the Domestic Policy Council; and Tino Cuellar, Special Assistant to the President for Justice and Regulatory Policy. (Muñoz, you will recall, is the former senior vice-president of the National Council of La Raza who has been·funneling tax dollars to radical Mexican separatists ever since she joined the Obama White House.)
In her email, Rogers referenced documents she forwarded in preparation for the upcoming meeting on the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), to which Hirsch replies that he looked forward to “reading these materials” and to “seeing everyone on Thursday.”

On February 23, 2011, Rogers·wrote to Associate Deputy Attorney General Robert Weiner, asking him to “make some headway with Attorney General [Eric] Holder in enforcing Section 7 of the NVRA.” The email notes that the DOJ had not yet filed any Section 7 lawsuits, which Rogers dubbed “deeply disappointing.” The first such DOJ lawsuit (against Rhode Island) was filed on March 18, 2011, less than one month later. Of particular note, is Rogers’ comment that “We have received oral assurances from [Assistant Attorney General Thomas] Perez on several occasions that enforcement action was imminent,” suggesting that Rogers was privy to internal discussions inside the DOJ regarding pending legal action.
On March 29, 2011, Rogers·wrote to Associate Attorney General [Thomas] Perrelli, urging him to review and “make improvements” to a document she was sending following another meeting held on March 17, 2011, between Project Vote and the DOJ on Section 7 compliance with the NRVA. Accompanying the document was a previous letter she had sent to the Civil Rights Division plus “additional comments on the Q and A.”
These documents raise fundamental questions about the politicization of the DOJ under Eric Holder and demonstrate that the ACORN-connected Project Vote is throwing its weight around the DOJ and driving the agency’s voting rights agenda.

And, evidently the Obama White House is now directly implicated in this growing scandal. It is now clear that Project Vote and the Obama/Holder DOJ are conspiring to file DOJ lawsuits to help re-elect Barack Obama. This collusion between Project Vote and the Obama administration is a significant threat to the integrity of the 2012 elections.

To have Project Vote involved in DOJ voting rights enforcement is like having the Mafia run the FBI! And Estelle Rogers is one of Project Vote’s key “bosses.”

As Director of Advocacy for Project Vote, Estelle Rogers ‒ a former attorney for ACORN, which was besieged with charges of corruption before declaring bankruptcy in November 2010 ‒ is a primary contact person on policy matters at Project Vote at both the state and federal levels and has been actively involved in voter registration issues. Using the threat of a lawsuit under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), Project Vote has aggressively sought to manipulate voter registration laws in various states in an effort to increase the registration of people receiving public assistance.

On August 4, 2011, Judicial Watch released documents obtained from the·Colorado Department of State showing that ACORN and Project Vote successfully pressured Colorado officials into implementing new policies for increasing the registration of public assistance recipients during the 2008 and 2010 election seasons. Following the policy changes, the percentage of invalid voter registration forms from Colorado public assistance agencies was four times the national average. Project Vote also sought a “legislative fix” to allow people without a driver’s license or state identification to register to vote online.

In addition to pursuing public agency registration cases in Missouri, Ohio, Indiana, Georgia and New Mexico, Project Vote and the NAACP filed a lawsuit on April 19, 2011, against the State of Louisiana alleging violations of the NVRA. Less than three months later, on July 12, the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division/Voting Section sued Louisiana on the same grounds, claiming that “Louisiana officials have not routinely offered voter registration forms, assistance and services to the state’s eligible citizens who apply, recertify or provide a change address for public assistance or disability services.”

The DOJ’s March 11, 2011, lawsuit against Rhode Island led to policy changes intended to increase the number of voter registration applications processed by “public assistance and disability service officers.” These two lawsuits, filed within five months of each other, are the first such lawsuits filed by the DOJ since 2007.

Project Vote and ACORN have both been linked to massive voter registration fraud. A total of 70 ACORN employees in 12 states have been convicted of voter registration fraud. And as documented in a July 2009 report by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, of the 1.3 million registrations Project Vote/ACORN submitted in the 2008 election cycle, more than one-third were invalid. (And don’t believe the line that ACORN is dead. As we documented in our special report “The Rebranding of ACORN,” the corrupt organization is alive and well and ready to wreak havoc in the 2012 elections.)

A storm is fast approaching in 2012. The integrity of our elections is under attack by ACORN and Project Vote. And it now appears that the Obama administration is complicit in a plot by these community organizations to steal the elections. Trust Judicial Watch to do what it can to uphold the rule of law against this very real challenge to our election system.

New Judicial Watch-Harris Interactive Poll Sends Warning to Washington Politicians

On Thursday, Judicial Watch released the results of a new nationwide survey of registered voters conducted in partnership with Harris Interactive. It concerns the American people’s attitudes on a variety of subjects, including government corruption, Obamacare, congressional insider trading, transparency, illegal immigration, and the Republican primary campaign. This is something we do on an annual basis and every year we get some very interesting results. This year was no different.

Here are some quick takeaways: Registered voters consider corruption to be a major problem, support illegal alien law enforcement, and believe President Obama has failed to keep his campaign promise to make government more transparent to the American people. Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, meanwhile, has significant national Republican support, nearly doubling the total of his closest rival, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. Registered voters are evenly split on whether the Supreme Court should uphold Obamacare.

The Judicial Watch survey was conducted by Harris Interactive January 12-15, 2012. (Full survey results, including crosstabs, are available here.) The following are the highlights:

REPUBLICAN NOMINATION: Republican and Republican leaning registered voters favor Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney (32%) over the rest of the Republican field by double digits. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich finishes second (17%). Ron Paul earns 14% support, with Rick Santorum garnering 10%.
GOVERNMENT CORRUPTION: The vast majority of registered voters (88%) believe corruption is a significant problem in Washington. More registered voters (45%) believe one of the Republican candidates would be more effective than Obama (34%) in addressing political corruption, with Ron Paul seen as the Republican best able to combat government corruption.
When asked generally which party was trusted more to combat government corruption, Republicans fared poorly in the poll. Only 30% thought Republicans could be trusted more versus 37% trusting Democrats more. A large number (33%) said neither/not sure.

TRANSPARENCY: The vast majority of registered voters (69%) believe President Obama has either worsened (27%) or not improved (42%) government transparency as he promised during the 2008 presidential campaign. Only slightly more than half of registered Democrats believe Obama has improved transparency.
ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: The majority of registered voters (53%) want more emphasis on law enforcement when addressing illegal immigration while only a small percentage (9%) want less. Meanwhile, three out of four registered voters (74%), including a majority of Hispanics (57%), believe local law enforcement officers should help enforce illegal immigration laws. A majority of registered voters (64%) disagree with illegal alien sanctuary policies, including a slight majority of Hispanics (51%). Poll respondents are evenly split on the President’s illegal immigration policies, with 42% disagreeing and 40% agreeing with the administration’s approach. (56% of Hispanic’s support the President’s policies).
OBAMACARE: Registered voters are nearly evenly split on whether or not Obamacare is constitutional and should be upheld by the Supreme Court. 44% think the law is constitutional and 43% think the law is unconstitutional, though self-identified independent voters think the law is unconstitutional by a margin of 47%-40%. In response to a question about the ongoing debate about whether Justice Elena Kagan should participate in the Supreme Court’s review of Obamacare, 37% (including one in four Democrats) oppose her participation and 34% support her participation. A significant number (28%) don’t know whether she should participate.
CONGRESSIONAL INSIDER TRADING: The vast majority of Americans (86%) believe insider trading laws should be enforced against members of Congress.
Let the results of this poll be a lesson for all politicians. Voters want to clean up corruption in Washington. The survey also represents a clear warning for Barack Obama who has fallen short on his campaign promise to make government more open and transparent in the minds of the majority of voters.

And Republicans should be worried that few Americans trust them to combat government corruption. While the public is evenly split on key issues such as Obamacare, they remain unified in support for more and better law enforcement in the area of illegal immigration.

I would expect in the coming months that both parties, recognizing the importance of corruption as a political issue, will pay lip service to the crisis. But what matters is what happens after the elections are over. Unfortunately, there is a mile wide gap between campaign rhetoric on corruption and the on-the-ground reality inside the halls of Congress and the White House.

I thought it interesting that the first official commercial of the Obama campaign highlights the President’s supposed ethics record. Without getting into a debate about the accuracy of the ad, this shows that at least the Obama campaign has the instinct to highlight the issue of government corruption as important to the American people.

(A note on the survey’s methodology: This study was conducted January 12-15, 2012, by Harris Interactive via telephone landline and cell phone on behalf of Judicial Watch. The survey was conducted among a nationwide cross-section of 871 Registered Voters; 686 interviews were from the landline sample and 185 interviews from the cell phone sample. The sampling error is +/-3.5 percent.)

JW Files Amicus Curiae Brief with Supreme Court Challenging U.S. Census Policy of Counting Illegal Aliens When Apportioning Seats in Congress

This next topic goes beyond the integrity of elections – it goes to the integrity of our entire system of government. Are you aware that the U.S. Census Bureau counts illegal aliens when determining how many seats in Congress a state should receive? That means states with large illegal alien populations are now receiving a disproportionate amount of seats in Congress and therefore more power in establishing national policy.

Judicial Watch is now involved in a high-stakes legal campaign to put a stop to this unconstitutional policy.

Last Friday, we filed an amicus curiae brief with the U.S. Supreme Court on behalf of the State of Louisiana challenging the current federal policy in which “unlawfully present aliens” were counted in the 2010 Census (Louisiana v. Bryson).

The government used these census numbers to reapportion seats in the House of Representatives and, as a result, the State of Louisiana lost a House seat to which it was entitled. Louisiana is asking that the Supreme Court order the federal government to recalculate the 2010 apportionment of House seats based upon legal residents as the U.S. Constitution requires.

Judicial Watch, in partnership with the Allied Educational Foundation (AEF), filed the brief on January 13, 2012, in a lawsuit filed by the State of Louisiana against John Bryson, U.S. Secretary of Commerce; Robert Groves, Director of the U.S. Census Bureau; and Karen Lehman Hass, Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Here’s a brief excerpt from our amicus:

Amici are concerned about the failure to enforce the nation’s immigration laws and the corrosive effect of this failure on our institutions and the rule of law. Among the problems caused by this failure is a redistribution of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives to States with large populations of unlawfully present aliens.

Amici respectfully submit that neither Article I Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, the Fourteenth Amendment, or any other provision of the Constitution authorize or permit the inclusion of unlawfully present aliens in the apportionment process. As a result, this case raises issues critical not just to Louisiana, but to every State, every American citizen, and our federal system of government.

Judicial Watch argues that, due to this Census Bureau policy, at least five states will lose House seats to which they are entitled.

For example, based upon the Census Bureau’s calculation, Louisiana is being allocated only six House seats, as opposed to the seven that it would have been apportioned, were it not for the inclusion of illegal aliens and “non-immigrant foreign nationals,” which encompasses holders of student visas and guest workers. The brief also notes that the “apportionment, in turn, determines the apportionment of electors in the Electoral College for the next three presidential elections.”

It is the contention of the State of Louisiana, Judicial Watch, and AEF that “the policy of counting unlawfully present aliens in the nation’s decennial census is unconstitutional and undermines both our federal system of government and our democratic institutions,” and is the “direct result of the failure to enforce our nation’s immigration laws.”

In other words, the U.S. Census is distorting the democratic process.

And the problem is only going to get worse considering the Obama administration’s hostility to enforcing illegal immigration laws, which is causing greater numbers of illegal aliens to flood into the country. You can see how that this failure to enforce immigration law undermines a foundational aspect of our democracy. We are pleased to join with the Allied Educational Foundation to file this amicus curiae brief in support of the State of Louisiana and the rule of law. And we hope the Supreme Court takes up this historic case and vindicates the right of American citizens to have full representation in Washington.

by AARON KLEIN

Prior to her appointment yesterday as the next director of President Obama’s Domestic Policy Council, longtime immigration reform advocate Cecilia Munoz served on the board of George Soros’ Open Society Institute.

Munoz also chaired the board of directors of the Center for Community Change, or CCC, a Soros-funded community organizing initiative whose board boasts activists from ACORN, MoveOn.org and other radical groups.

Munoz is currently the head of the White House office of intergovernmental affairs. She most recently worked for the National Council of La Raza, an open-borders group that lobbies for mass immigration and amnesty for illegal aliens.

The official White House statement announcing her new appointment yesterday noted Munoz’s previous work for both the CCC and Soros’ Institute.

“Over the past three years, Cecilia has been a trusted advisor who has demonstrated sound judgment day in and day out,” Obama said in the statement. “Cecilia has done an extraordinary job working on behalf of middle class families, and I’m confident she’ll bring the same unwavering dedication to her new position.”

Munoz’s new duties will include coordinating the policy-making process and supervising the execution of domestic policy in the White House.

While the White House release documented Munoz’s work for the CCC, the statement did not further define the CCC, which recruits and trains activists to spearhead “political issue campaigns” while advocating for more citizen involvement in community organizations.

Munoz worked at the CCC until late November 2008, when then-President-elect Obama announced Munoz had been selected for the position of director of intergovernmental affairs at the White House

The CCC bases its training programs on the techniques taught by radical organizer Saul Alinsky, with several prominent Alinskyites on the board that Munoz directed.

One such activist on CCC’s board is Heather Booth, founder of the Midwest Academy, which openly trains activists in Alinsky tactics.

Citizen Action of Wisconsin, an arm of Booth’s Midwest Academy, is part of the Moving Wisconsin Forward movement, one of the main organizers of the major Wisconsin protests last February. The protests were in opposition to Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal for most state workers to pay 12 percent of their health care premiums and 5.8 percent of their salary toward their own pensions.

The Woods Fund, a Chicago nonprofit on which Obama served as paid director alongside Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers, provided money to the Midwest Academy.

As WND previously reported, the executive director of Midwest Academy was part of the team that developed and delivered a group of volunteers for Obama’s 2008 campaign.

The CCC board, meanwhile, includes Arlene Holt Baker, executive vice president of the AFL-CIO; Tom Chabolla, assistant to SEIU president Mary Kay Henry; and Justin Ruben, executive director of MoveOn.org.

CCC’s executive director is Deepak Bhargava, a strong supporter of Obama, who for 10 years worked his way around ACORN before leading the CCC starting in 2002.

Bhargava is an editorial board member for the Nation magazine and a National Advisory Board member of Soros’ Open Society Institute.

That same Open Society Institute has provided funding to the CCC, as has the Tides Center, which is heavily financed by Soros.

The CCC, in conjunction with the Tides Advocacy Fund, also operates the website of Campaign to Reform Immigration for America.

Tides functions as a money tunnel in which major leftist donors provide large sums that are channeled to hundreds of radical groups.

Tides recently has been closely linked to Occupy since the anti-Wall Street movement’s inception. The Tides-funded Adbusters magazine is reported to have come up with the Occupy Wall Street idea after Arab Spring protests toppled governments in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia. The Adbusters website serves as a central hub for Occupy’s planning.

The Tides-funded Ruckus Society has been providing direct-action training to Occupy protesters as well as official training resources, including manuals, to Occupy training groups. Ruckus, which helped spark the 1999 World Trade Organization riots in Seattle, was also listed as a “friend and partner” of the Occupy Days of Action in October.

Another grantee of Tides is MoveOn.org, which has joined Occupy.

Tides also funds hundreds of other far-left causes. It was a primary financier of ACORN.

You know, a Community organizer pow-wow.Newly released records indicate that at least five associates from the voter fraud group, ACORN, visited the White House this year. One of the ACORN officials has been involved with the Department of Justice’s vetting process of employees to enforce anti-fraud voter laws.

American Spectator reported:
Leaders of the resurrected radical group ACORN are lobbying the Obama administration in what appears to be a concerted effort to game the electoral system to help Democrats, new evidence suggests.

At least five Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now leaders have visited the White House this year alone. One of those ACORN officials has been involved in vetting Department of Justice hires who may help to enforce the voter fraud-enabling National Voting Rights Act (NVRA), also known as the Motor-Voter law. The Department has come under fire for refusing to enforce Section 8, which requires states to remove the names of ineligible felons, the dead, and non-residents from voter rolls, while zealously enforcing Section 7, which requires states to register voters at welfare offices.

According to documents obtained by Judicial Watch under the Freedom of Information Act, former ACORN attorney Estelle H. Rogers, who is now director of advocacy at ACORN-affiliated Project Vote, wrote T. Christian Herren, Chief of the Voting Section in the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, recommending three prospective new DOJ employees. [...]

Meanwhile, in addition to collaborating with DOJ officials, Rogers also visited the White House on March 2, 2011, according to the White House visitors database. During that visit she met with Shasti Conrad, a senior aide to Obama uber-adviser Valerie Jarrett, and Jon Carson, director of the White House Office of Public Engagement. Carson was previously chief of staff at the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) serving under Van Jones, the self-described communist who was known as Obama’s green jobs czar.

House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa is calling for an investigation into allegations that ACORN-related group New York Communities for Change “engaged in fraud through its participation in the Occupy Wall Street protests.”
In a letter dated Monday, Issa, R-Calif., called for U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch of the Eastern District of New York to launch a probe into allegations first reported by FoxNews.com that NYCC may have “solicited donations from union members under false pretenses and misappropriated those funds to support the protesters.”

In an Oct. 26. report, FoxNews.com quoted sources within NYCC who said that the group — run and staffed by nearly all former ACORN employees — was asking for donations for specific charitable purposes, including for the teachers union and PCB toxin testing in New York City schools.
However, those donations were being rerouted to pay for Occupy Wall Street protests, the sources said.
Issa requests Lynch to “investigate these allegations to determine if they have merit and prosecute any wrongdoing accordingly.”
When asked to comment on Issa’s letter, Lynch’s spokesman Robert Nardoza would only say, “I have no comment as it is a matter of policy that we do not confirm/deny or discuss investigations.”
A spokesman for NYCC did not immediately return FoxNews.com’s request for comment.
Issa’s letter quotes from the initial FoxNews.com report. In that report, sources described how staff members collected door-to-door for the PCB campaign but then pooled the money and sent it elsewhere.
“We go to Freeport, Central Islip, Park Slope, everywhere, and we say we’re collecting money for PCBs testing in schools. But the money isn’t going to the campaign,” one source told FoxNews.com. “It’s going to Occupy Wall Street, and we’re not using that money to get schools tested for deadly chemicals or to make their kids safer. It’s just going to the protests, and that’s just so terrible.”
Issa also referenced a second FoxNews.com report, which quoted sources inside NYCC saying the organization had fired employees and shred reams of paper in response to the original report.
Issa said ACORN’s history of corruption is concerning, but what’s worse is NYCC’s fraud.
“NYCC misused the money of hardworking union members,” he wrote. “NYCC allegedly tried to destroy evidence and hide the organization’s ties to ACORN. NYCC allegedly has initiated a campaign to shred documents and intimidate employees to prevent them from discussing the organization’s involvement in the Occupy Wall Street protests,” Issa wrote.
“The alleged misconduct by NYCC, and the subsequent efforts to cover it up, merits scrutiny from the United States Attorney’s Office,” he wrote.
Rep. Michael G. Grimm, R-N.Y., supported Issa’s call for an investigation.
“It is no surprise to hear that an ACORN-affiliated group may be connected to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Their track record of fraud and links to deceitful activity demand that these allegations be thoroughly investigated and prosecuted to the full extent of the law,” he said in a statement to FoxNews.com.
“Furthermore, I am disgusted by the group’s alleged fundraising methods. … As someone who has taken a strong stance urging the city to remove the dangerous PCB from NYC’s public schools in order to protect the safety of our children, I find this reprehensible.”

ACORN and other radical left-wing groups would be eligible for up to $15 billion in federal funding if President Obama’s new economic stimulus package becomes law.
Section 261 of the bill provides $15 billion for “Project Rebuild.” Grants would be given to “qualified nonprofit organizations, businesses or consortia of eligible entities for the redevelopment of abandoned and foreclosed-upon properties and for the stabilization of affected neighborhoods.” Radical groups like ACORN won’t get the whole $15 billion, though, because they will have to compete with state and local governments for the money.
In March of this year, Obama’s Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) gave a $79,819 grant to the Miami branch of the massive conglomerate known as ACORN Housing Corp. (AHC). AHC filed papers in 2010 legally changing its name to Affordable Housing Centers of America (AHCOA). The nonprofit corporation owed $162,813 in back taxes to the IRS, states, and cities as of this past July.
Despite the new name, AHCOA is the same old corrupt organization. It even uses AHC’s federal Employer Identification Number (72-1048321). AHCOA operates out of the same office address (209 W. Jackson Blvd., 3rd Floor, Chicago, IL 60606) and uses the same telephone number (312-939-1611).
Now that public polling shows Americans are realizing that economic stimulus programs don’t work, the Obama administration is calling the latest round of futile stimulus a “jobs bill.” In a sense it really is a jobs bill: a jobs bill for Saul Alinsky-inspired community organizers.
The draft legislation, which had not yet been introduced in Congress at press time, makes ACORN, Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA), and a phalanx of leftist groups that regularly feed at the public trough eligible for funding.
Section 261 of the bill provides $15 billion for “Project Rebuild.” Grants would be given to “qualified nonprofit organizations, businesses or consortia of eligible entities for the redevelopment of abandoned and foreclosed-upon properties and for the stabilization of affected neighborhoods.” Radical groups like ACORN won’t get the whole $15 billion, though, because they will have to compete with state and local governments for the money.
ACORN would have to get creative to extract grant money from the $5 billion allotted in the legislative package for two other competitive grant programs covered in sections 214 and 215. At first glance ACORN wouldn’t seem to be eligible for funding under the Community Oriented Policing Stabilization Fund and First Responder Stabilization Fund, but oddly enough the group has managed over the years to receive funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, so anything’s possible.
But there is every reason to believe ACORN, which has long been in the real estate development business, will get a chunk of the $15 billion. President Obama, who used to work for ACORN, wants to give his allies taxpayer dollars regardless of whether it is lawful to do so.
In March of this year, Obama’s Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) gave a $79,819 grant to the Miami branch of the massive conglomerate known as ACORN Housing Corp. (AHC). AHC filed papers in 2010 legally changing its name to Affordable Housing Centers of America (AHCOA). The nonprofit corporation owed $162,813 in back taxes to the IRS, states, and cities as of this past July.
Despite the new name, AHCOA is the same old corrupt organization. It even uses AHC’s federal Employer Identification Number (72-1048321). AHCOA operates out of the same office address (209 W. Jackson Blvd., 3rd Floor, Chicago, IL 60606) and uses the same telephone number (312-939-1611).
AHCOA is run by the same people who ran the ACORN network. Michael Shea, AHC’s longtime executive director, remains in the same post at AHCOA. AHCOA president Alton Bennett and board member Dorothy Amadi were involved with AHC and are longtime ACORN activists. (There are more examples of overlap between AHC and AHCOA, but I’ll spare you them for now.)
The $79,819 grant to the former ACORN Housing comes out of HUD’s Education and Outreach Initiative (EOI) program, a political indoctrination program that gives nonprofit groups money to rail against lenders and the supposed unfairness of the capitalist system.
The circumstances of the grant are particularly striking. HUD was so eager to start funding ACORN again that it apparently
broke the law, taking the cash out of fiscal 2010 appropriations. This is a problem because Congress banned federal funding of ACORN through the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2010. But two months earlier HUD cited the congressional ban when it withheld a $461,086 grant to AHCOA. Something happened between January and March. In March HUD relied on a government lawyer’s dubious legal opinion from 2010 that ACORN Housing was no longer part of the ACORN network — and the new $79,819 grant went through.
And now there are dozens of new ACORN offshoot groups ready to devour taxpayers’ money, as I write in my new book, Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers.
Many of the new ACORN groups — with names like New York Communities for Change and Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment — are eligible for federal funding. They have obtained Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) numbers which nonprofits are required to have in order to seek federal grants.
Matthew Vadum is an award-winning investigative reporter and the author of the recently published book, “Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts Are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers
If the proposed Jobs for Community Organizers bill becomes law it’s a safe bet the rebranded ACORN groups will be first in line with grant applications.

One of the complaints lodged against conservatives by liberals, often even by libertarians, is that in matters such as abortion, drug laws, and marriage laws “you can’t legislate morality,” they claim that though they personally oppose one or all these things, it really comes down to a personal choice of the individual and the government should stay out of it. But their hypocrisy is exposed when you talk about some of the things they want to legislate, such as requiring all to pay into government “charity” in the form of welfare, limiting access to firearms, dictating what type of medical insurance you can or must have, what kind of food your children can have, and a myriad of other “nanny state” doctrines.

This liberal ideology forces people to do and/or pay for things that they are opposed to, and takes away their personal choice. So how do they justify this? By saying it is “right,” “just,”, “fair,” meaning of course, moral. So they are perfectly willing to legislate morality, as long as it is their brand of morality. I have even heard a Christian liberal in my church say that these things are all in alignment with Christ’s command to love others and to care for them. I guess he doesn’t mind that forced charity is not charity at all, or that free will was endorsed by Christ, or that there are better ways of doing this than having the government do it.

My libertarian friends on the other hand would tend to agree with the liberals on the items in the first paragraph, and with me on the items in the second paragraph. And that is good in that it is at least consistent. However, libertarianism is pretty much “anarchy-lite;” it is basically opposed nearly all laws and to anything that presumes to define what is acceptable or unacceptable in society.

A conservative looks at all laws and taxes with a critical eye, yet they recognize that to have civil society requires some laws and the taxes to support them. All but a true anarchist agree that laws are needed to protect against violence, define protected property rights, provide for honest commerce, and protect against government abuse of personal rights. Conservatives recognize that there are legitimate reasons to have other civil laws, such as highway standards, building codes, professional certification, and traffic laws.

The real hypocrisy of saying that you can’t legislate morality is the simple fact that any law that protects people from the rule of the strongest is in fact a legislation of morality. Morality is the core basis of civilization.

by Tiffany Gabbay
According to a report from the Government Accountability Office, 11 out of 27 federal agencies failed to promptly implement ACORN funding restriction even though lawmakers voted in 2009 to cut of funds.
“Not all agencies had taken action to implement the funding restriction provisions prior to when we began our review in August 2010,” the report determined. “Specifically, 11 agencies—CNCS, DOD, DOS, DOT, HHS, NASA, NEH, NARA, NSF, the Small Business Administration (SBA), and Social Security Administration (SSA)—indicated that they took action to implement the restriction, at least in part, as a result of our inquiries and subsequent conversations.”
It goes on to say that four agencies gave nine awards to various ACORN-related groups in FY 2010, including the Tides Foundation. However, it noted that some of those were later retracted while other recipients were determined to no longer have an ACORN affiliation:
For fiscal year 2010, four agencies initially made nine awards to organizations included in this report—specifically, Tides Center (six awards), ACORN Albuquerque (also known as ACORN Associates) (one award), ACORN Community Land Association of Louisiana (one award), and New York Agency for Community Affairs (one award), but the awards to the latter three organizations were retracted, and we determined that after 2009, Tides Center no longer had any indicators of affiliation with ACORN. For the first two quarters of fiscal year 2011, one agency made two awards to ACORN Housing Corporation (New Orleans)—currently Affordable Housing Centers of America (AHCOA). One of these awards was retracted, and in September 2010, we found that AHCOA did not have any indicators of affiliation with ACORN.
WHAT HAPPENED TO BIDENS CAMPAIGN AGAINST CORRUPTION?

I do not like you Jihad Jane.
I do not like you; not at all.
I do not like you on a train.
I do not like your Jihad call.

I do not like you on a plane.
I do not like you a little bit.
I do not like you in the rain.
I do not like your murderous snit.

And I will not like you ever again.
I hope you go to federal jail,
There to feed on ham and gin,
So you will go to infidel hell.

I saw a political cartoon today that has Patrick Henry saying, “Give me liberty or give me civility.” The apparent point being that civility is a limit on liberty. There is a saying that people in the old west tended to be rather polite, because everybody was armed; to the degree that is true, people voluntarily limited the offensiveness of their speech as a matter of prudence. The reality is that anything that governs any action is a limit on liberty, which is why the Founding Fathers held the idea of limited government as a basic tenet of the foundation of our republic.

There is a balance that should be maintained between complete freedom to say and behave in any way a person chooses and in civility and polite behavior. Politeness and civility come from a person’s upbringing and the social culture of society.

When I was a child, in the 1950’s, society was considerably more polite than it is today, not only in speech, but in grooming, dress, and general behavior. Men were careful of their personal appearance, were chivalrous, tipping their hats (everyone wore a hat), stepping aside to allow others to pass on the sidewalk, holding doors for women, children, and the elderly, and watching their language in public.

The big change to this came from the younger members of my generation in the late sixties and seventies. Inspired by left-leaning professors, it started with college students who refused to honor the draft, developed into opposition to the Viet Nam war; running counter to traditional patriotic support of our soldiers during time of war. This bloomed into the hippy era, drug culture, free love, abortion rights, women’s rights, environmentalism, and a general anti-establishment philosophy. They rose up in a mass rebellion against pretty much every social and moral more of the time.

From the close of World War II, the Soviet Union was very actively working to foment this type of unrest through agents and contacts in the American Communist Party, the Socialist Party, labor unions, the universities, and the media. These have elevated extremism to mainstream politics via left wing groups from followers of Alinsky, SDS, Acorn, and various other “community organizations” and radical groups.

The McCarthy hearings of the early fifties identified some of this activity, but concentrated most on the film industry, where they were fairly successful in disarming that propaganda effort. The irony of the Soviet success in placing socialist plants and creating civil unrest was that, while they ended up succeeding beyond their original hope, it did not cause a push for Soviet style communism, but instead a push toward greater liberty; almost, but not quite, an anarchy type of freedom.

There were some very good things that came from all this. Freedom of speech and expression were given a greater emphasis than ever before. Women gained equality in the workplace and a greater say in the political and civic arena. Citizens became openly hostile toward public corruption and cronyism. Industrial pollution and toxic waste has been reduced by probably 90%.

Business has been changed from the type X labor/management conflict model to a more win/win approach. Families have switched from a rigid patriarchal style, to more of a partnership with greater parental involvement with children. All these are examples of the good that came out of this period of unrest.

However, there were almost an equal number of bad things that came from this period; it was a sort of a “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” situation. The polite civility of our parent’s generation didn’t completely disappear, but it was badly damaged and greatly reduced.

The use of slang, poor grammar, and of aggressive, offensive, and threatening language greatly increased. Self-discipline and personal accountability have been replaced with selfish hedonism and victimization. The concept of earning respect was replaced with deserving respect. Our children have been raised to believe that competing is bad, and winning isn’t important; everybody deserves the same reward regardless of personal effort and performance.

Political correctness has created a society unable to address differences between cultures, races, or other social distinctions, while at the same time destroying the concept of the American social “melting pot.” We now have Afro-, Hispano-, Asian-, etc. Americans who believe the culture and values of their homeland or racial group is more important than their identity as Americans. We have inadvertently created a new type of segregation.

So in addition to the many good things, the history of the Baby Boomers and their children has created all kinds of bad fall-out. Examples are extremely high rates of birth out of wedlock, huge numbers of abortions, huge numbers of single parent families, widespread use of drugs, illogical environmental and social laws, great loss of heavy industry, tremendous growth in government and the taxes required to support it, and a less civil, more crude society.

A second irony is the left accusing the right of using violent rhetoric when the use of extreme aggressive violent language, hyperbole, rhetoric , and imagery has been an invention and mainstay of the left; they are now accusing a much more mild right, in particular the Tea Party and talk radio, of abusing freedom of speech with excessive use of violent language. For any liberal to make such an accusation is not only ironic, but also hypocritical.

Personally, I would like for people on all sides of the political spectrum to avoid aggressive language and instead endeavor to express their ideas and opposition with more accuracy and less emotion. I don’t think this will really happen, because the left is steeped in the concept of using every crisis to drive an emotional following to a loud attack on their opposition.

I recently stated that I dislike seeing the Republicans “playing nice” with the Democrats; and I definitely feel that way. I think the Republicans need to respect the right of the Democrats to their opinions, but I also think Republicans need to strongly counter those damaging and anti-American ideas.

Modern politics is more clearly than ever aligned between not just conservative and liberal, but right and wrong. The conservatives are simply right, and the liberals are simply wrong, and there is nothing in that to compromise. I would rather see congress unable to ever pass another law than to pass one more law that will hurt our country.

An example of left-wing civility

A Las Vegas judge has spared senior ACORN executive Amy Adele Busefink jail time for her role in a notorious voter fraud conspiracy.

Judge Donald Mosley sentenced Busefink to two years imprisonment but suspended the jail time provided that she abides by the terms of her probation. She was also fined a total of $4,000 and ordered to perform 100 hours of community service. Prosecutors had argued for a fine of just $1,000. Voter fraud, sometimes called electoral fraud, is a blanket term encompassing a host of election-related improprieties.

This isn’t the first time Busefink was involved in shady electoral dealings. Even while under indictment in Nevada she ran the 2010 national voter drive for Project Vote, which was President Obama’s employer in 1992. Project Vote and ACORN have long been indistinguishable. Project Vote still operates out of ACORN’s offices in Washington, D.C.

Busefink also ran ACORN’s fraud-ridden 2008 voter registration drive. In that drive, officials chucked an astounding 400,000 bogus registrations.

Why are we so soft on these crooks?

The scandal-plagued ACORN may no longer exist, but its tarnished legacy lives on in court, as the activist group and its former employees face criminal punishment.

So far this year, at least 18 former workers have admitted guilt or been convicted on varying charges of election fraud. The punishment has ranged from probation to several months of prison time.

ACORN, once a powerful advocate for low-income and minority voters, shuttered its operations amid plummeting revenues in March, six months after conservative activists posing as a pimp and prostitute caught on video some of the group’s employees offering them tax advice.

But the group is still facing charges in Nevada on conspiracy to commit the crime of compensation for registration of voters.The trial, originally scheduled to begin Monday, has been postponed likely until next year.

Former workers across the country already are being punished for their criminal activities.

In Miami, seven former ACORN voter registration canvassers were convicted of “false swearing-in an election,” and sentenced to probation and community service and banned from participating in future political campaigns, according to court documents.

In Pennsylvania, six of seven former ACORN workers who were charged in an investigation were convicted of unsworn falsification and interference with election officials. Four have reached a plea agreement on reduced charges and will serve two years of probation. Cases against two others who entered pleas to reduced charges are pending.

Charges against the seventh, Eric Jordan, are not being prosecuted because Jordan has pleaded guilty to much more serious charges, including aggravated assault, resisting arrest and carrying firearms without a license.

In Milwaukee, three former ACORN workers have been convicted of election fraud.

Last week, Kevin Clancy was sentenced to 10 months in prison for his role in submitting falsified voter registration forms before the 2008 election. Clancy will start his sentence once he finishes another sentence he is currently serving for armed robbery.

Clancy’s co-worker, Maria Miles, who pleaded guilty to election fraud in August, will be sentenced on Dec. 6.

In September, Frank Walton pleaded guilty to submitting 54 fake voter registrations during the 2008 presidential campaign. He faces up to 42 months in prison and a $10,000 fine when he’s sentenced Dec. 6.

In Washington state, Kendra Lynn Thill was convicted in March of voter registration fraud in the 2006 midterm election. In Nevada, a former ACORN supervisor pleaded the equivalent of a no-contest in a case alleging that canvassers were illegally paid to register voters during the 2008 campaign. But while Amy Busefink’s plea acknowledges the state had evidence for a conviction at trial, her lawyer said she still plans to challenge the constitutionality of the state law prohibiting paying canvassers based on the number of voter registration forms they turn in.

SORRY GEORGE – YOU LOSE AGAIN.

A supervisor for the now defunct political advocacy group the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, has entered into a plea bargain with prosecutors in a case alleging that canvassers were illegally paid to register Nevada voters during the 2008 presidential campaign.

Amy Busefink, 28, pleaded no-contest in state court to two misdemeanor counts of conspiracy to commit the crime of compensation for registration of voters. Her nolo contendere plea acknowledged the state had sufficient evidence for a conviction if the case went to trial.

Busefink is expected to get a slap on the wrist, according to critics of ACORN, with only one year of probation, a $1,000 fine and 100 hours of community service probable.

Last month, House Republican Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri applauded reports that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had opened a criminal investigation into whether the left-wing advocacy group ACORN has violated federal election law by fostering and promoting a national program of voter registration fraud.

The Associated Press reported at the time that “the FBI is actively pursuing leads in the investigation of ACORN. Word of the investigation comes less than a week after Blunt joined Reps. Candice Miller (R-Mich.), Vernon Ehlers (R-Mich.), Dean Heller (R-Nev.), Tom Cole (R-Okla.), and Lamar Smith (R-Texas) in sending a letter to the Department of Justice urging it to act.”

Blunt, a former secretary of state in Missouri, joined other House leaders in urging the Bureau to “take all active and appropriate measures” to ensure the civil rights of legitimate voting Americans aren’t diluted by systemic voter fraud.

“I am proud to join three former secretaries of state now serving in Congress, as well as our ranking members on the Judiciary and Administration committees, in calling on the Justice Department to stand up in defense of the sanctity of Americans’ right to vote — and, as important, their right to be assured that vote counts,” said the Missouri congressman.

“News that the [Justice] Department has heeded that call and begun the process of unraveling ACORN’s widespread program of alleged voter registration fraud is a heartening development — and one all Americans ought to take notice of as they prepare to exercise their most basic civic duty next month,” said the GOP veteran.

“I want to applaud the Department of Justice for taking this important step, and associate myself with the efforts of Leader Boehner to ensure not one more dime of taxpayer money is diverted into the coffers of this organization until Justice completes its review and determines whether ACORN’s actions merit criminal prosecution,” said Rep. Blunt.

Obama’s spokespersons claim he had a limited relationship with ACORN. However, the record shows that “[Obama] says he is drawn to politics, despite its superficialities, as a means to advance his real passion and calling: community organization. … In 1992 Obama took time off to direct Project Vote, an ACORN program said to be the most successful grass-roots voter-registration campaign in recent [Chicago] history.”

ACORN officials have admitted to submitting fraudulent voter registration forms in Ohio and press reports confirmed that ACORN submitted hundreds of fraudulent voter registration forms in Kansas City, forcing local officials to wade through fraudulent voter registrations, potentially disenfranchising legitimate voters.

SORRY GEORGE – GET USED TO LOSING. WE ARE ON TO YOUR GAME.

These headlines say it all:
• U.S. 2010 Budget Deficit at $1.342 Trillion
• Health Care Reform Opposition Grows as Public Learns More
• Obama’s approval ratings drop
• Dems Breaking With Obama’s Economic Plan
• Desperate Dems Double Personal Attack Ads
• Grijalva Staffer Allegedly Caught with McClung Signs
• Harry Reid Set Up Fraud, Dirty Tricks
• Top Union Official Caught on Tape Discussing Voter Fraud
• More States Report Rampant Vote Fraud TX, AZ, PA, IL, NJ, NY, NC
• FLA City Commish Arrested Ballot Fraud
• Fifteen Missouri Counties Have More Voters Than Census Population

As more people see what is happening they are backing away from Obama’s hopeful change to socialism, destruction of the economy, and infringement on personal liberties. Democrat candidates are distancing them from their president and party. Desperation is driving them to dirty politics, criminal activity, and voter fraud.
We need every conservative to vote; too much is at stake. Don’t allow the left to steal any seats in this election.

by Matthew Vadum

Like a zombie in a horror movie, ACORN is alive! Even worse, it’s still in the business of registering Mickey Mouse and dead people to vote—and the person running its get-out-the-vote operation is under indictment for felony voter registration fraud.
But first, some background.
The radical group staged an elaborate prank on April Fool’s Day by pretending to die. That’s when chief organizer Bertha Lewis said ACORN would dissolve its national structure. But the group still exists and continues to send out direct mail solicitations for funds.
Disturbingly, Project Vote, ACORN’s scandal-plagued voter registration and mobilization division, remains open for business. Project Vote has been part of the ACORN family since at least 1992 when Barack Obama ran a successful voter drive in Illinois.
Although legally separate entities, in practice the two are the same, as the congressional testimony of former ACORN/Project Vote employee Anita MonCrief can attest. They share office space, employees, and budgets. Project Vote continues to operate out of ACORN’s Washington, D.C., headquarters.
Even worse, its voter drive is being run by Amy Busefink, an ACORN employee under indictment in Nevada for violating election laws. It might be understandable for an employer not to fire an employee until she is actually convicted of a crime, but this is ridiculous. Busefink should not be running a voter drive.
Busefink’s official Project Vote biography says: “As Project Vote’s Field Director, Amy Busefink is responsible for the development and execution of field activities across Project Vote’s many program areas … Over the last two years, Ms. Busefink has participated in the successful fight against legislation that creates barriers to voters, including photo ID efforts in Missouri. She continues to develop voter participation and voter registration field programs, utilizing new and exciting technology for Get-Out-the-Vote efforts.”
The bio adds that Busefink “came to Project Vote as its national voter registration director in June 2006, when she assumed responsibility for Project Vote’s 2006 voter registration program.” She also “ran field operations for Project Votes [sic] 2008 voter registration program, which collected 1.1 million applications.” [emphasis added]
ACORN and Project Vote did collect more than one million voter registration applications in 2008, but 400,000 applications “were rejected by election officials for a variety of reasons, including duplicate registrations, incomplete forms and fraudulent submissions,” the New York Times reported.
Why does Project Vote acknowledge on its website that a potential felon is running its GOTV effort? (ACORN has a habit of scrubbing its digital tracks so I made a screen grab as a backup just in case.)
Perhaps ACORN thinks no one will notice that Busefink has been indicted for criminal election law violations in Nevada.
In May 2009, Nevada Atty. Gen. Catherine Cortez Masto, and Secretary of State Ross Miller, both Democrats, made public charges against two senior ACORN employees—Busefink, ACORN’s deputy regional director at the time, and Christopher Edwards, then ACORN’s Las Vegas field director. Both were implicated in a conspiracy in which they and ACORN as a corporate entity were charged. Edwards pleaded guilty and has turned state’s evidence. The trial of ACORN and Busefink is scheduled to begin on November 26.
The state’s charges list 26 felony counts of voter fraud and 13 of providing unlawful extra compensation to those registering voters, a practice forbidden under Nevada law because it incentivizes fraud. Canvassers were allegedly paid between $8 and $9 an hour and based on a quota of 20 voters per shift.
“From July 27 through Oct. 2, ACORN also provided additional compensation under a bonus program called ‘Blackjack’ or ‘21+’ that was based on the total number of voters a person registered.” Canvassers bringing in 21 or more completed forms per day would receive a $5 bonus. The complaint says Edwards created the illegal bonus scheme and that “ACORN timesheets indicate that corporate officers of ACORN were aware of the Blackjack bonus program and failed to take immediate action to stop it.”
Inside sources say Project Vote is lying low during the current election cycle and plans to return in full force for President Obama’s reelection campaign in 2012. Earlier this year, I was told that Project Vote was having a banner year despite ACORN’s troubles and may be raking in more money than in 2008 when it reported receiving $14,635,002 in contributions and grants.
Project Vote is working with eight groups on voter drives. One is Pennsylvania Neighborhoods for Social Justice (PNSJ), a “new” group operating out of ACORN’s offices in Philadelphia. Longtime ACORN national board member Carol Hemingway is on the board of PNSJ and its sister nonprofit, Pennsylvania Communities Organizing for Change (PCOC).
Although ACORN closed many of its offices, Lewis has been working with a skeleton staff. Congressional investigators say she is consolidating power and hoarding assets. They estimate ACORN has $20 million in cash and that its affiliates hold another $10 million.
ACORN plans to resurface under a new name soon, according to John Atlas, author ofSeeds of Change, a book sympathetic to ACORN. ACORN chapters in at least 13 states and the District of Columbia changed their names and obtained separate nonprofit status.
In related news, the Obama Administration is stonewalling Capital Research Center’s Freedom of Information Act request that seeks correspondence between HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan and ACORN. HUD FOIA requests must be answered within 45 days but our request has been pending for seven months.
The request was filed because Donovan is a longtime ally of ACORN. He worked closely with ACORN for five years when he was New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Housing Development commissioner but as HUD secretary the word ACORN never escapes his lips.
“Perhaps no administration official has had more interaction with ACORN than” Donovan, the New York Times reported (Oct. 16, 2009). ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis admitted as much. “We grew to respect him, and he grew to respect us.”