New Report Asks If ACORN Is Structured As A Criminal Enterprise
July 24, 2009
The Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee issued an 88-page report yesterday asking the question “Is ACORN Structured as a Criminal Enterprise?”
As the report states,
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) has repeatedly and deliberately engaged in systemic fraud. Both structurally and operationally, ACORN hides behind a paper wall of nonprofit corporate protections to conceal a criminal conspiracy on the part of its directors, to launder federal money in order to pursue a partisan political agenda and to manipulate the American electorate.
Some of the most serious allegations concern possible fraud in voter registration.
But the Republicans’ charges go beyond this, to include submission of false filings, covering up embezzlement, and others. Some of ACORN’s affiliates are tax-exempt, some are not. Some receive Federal funds, some do not. But funds are allegedly shifted back and forth between different subsidiaries, making it hard to track the restrictions that apply to various types of money, such as the prohibition on partisan political activity on Federal grants.
All this matters not just because of the alleged criminal activity, but because ACORN gets your tax dollars. As the report notes, ” Since 1994, more than $53 million in federal funds have been pumped into ACORN, and under the Obama administration, ACORN stands to receive a whopping $8.5 billion in available stimulus funds.” Even in DC, that’s real money - particularly for an organization that has now been charged with covering up embezzlement.
Republicans on the committee are using this report to call for a criminal investigation of ACORN. Given the evidence they present, will the Democrats join them? What about State Attorneys General?
On the evidence the Republicans have offered, there seems plenty to keep investigators busy for a very long time. ACORN shouldn’t get a dime of federal funding until and unless these allegations are resolved.