Another bogus ACORN lawsuit
Photoshop credit: Leo Alberti
Another bogus ACORN lawsuit
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2009
ACORN is doing what it does best: Playing the victim, blaming everyone else for its self-inflicted wounds, perpetuating false narratives, and defending the entitlement industry to the death.
On Thursday, the disgraced welfare rights organization filed suit over a congressional funding ban passed in September after nationwide undercover sting videos exposed ACORN’s criminal racket. The group and its web of non-profit, tax-exempt affiliates have collected an estimated $53 million in government funds since 1994. This pipeline is apparently a constitutionally-protected right. According to ACORN’s lawyers at the far Left Center for Constitutional Rights, the congressional funding ban constitutes a “bill of attainder” – an act of the legislature declaring a person(s) guilty of a crime without trial.
Now, cue the world’s smallest violin and pass the Kleenex: ACORN’s lawyers say the group has suffered cutbacks and layoffs as a result of the punitive funding ban. The congressional persecution means ACORN can no longer teach first-time-homebuyer indoctrination classes and – gasp – the loss of an $800,000 contract to conduct “outreach” on “asthma.” Message: The demons in the House who cut off ACORN (345 of them, including 172 Democrats) are cutting off oxygen to poor people!
“It’s not the job of Congress to be the judge, jury, and executioner,” CCR lawyer Jules Lobel moaned as he equated the House’s act of fiscal responsibility with the death penalty. “It is outrageous to see Congress violating the Constitution for purposes of political grandstanding,” CCR Legal Director Bill Quigley seethed without a shred of irony. “Congress bowed to FOX News and joined in the scapegoating of an organization that helps average Americans going through hard times to get homes, pay their taxes, and vote. Shame on them.” ACORN head Bertha Lewis, piled on in an affidavit lamenting the loss of state, local, and private foundation grants, which she blamed on the resolution. It “gave the green light for others to terminate our funds as well.”
What ACORN’s sob story-tellers leave out is the inconvenient fact that non-profits were bailing on ACORN long before undercover journalists Hanah Giles, James O’Keefe, and BigGovernment.com publisher Andrew Breitbart entered the scene. Internal ACORN records from a Washington, D.C. meeting held last August noted that over $2 million in foundation money was being withheld as a result of the group’s $5 million embezzlement scandal involving founder Wade Rathke’s brother, Dale.
Rathke admitted he suppressed disclosure of his brother’s massive theft—first discovered in 2000—because “word of the embezzlement would have put a ‘weapon’ into the hands of enemies of Acorn.” In other words: The protection of ACORN’s political viability came before protection of members’ dues (and taxpayers’ funds). Rathke’s supporters on ACORN’s board helped cover up the crime by carrying the amount his brother embezzled as a “loan” on the books of Citizens Consulting Inc. CCI, the accounting and financial management arm of ACORN and its complex web of affiliates, is housed in the same building as the national ACORN headquarters in New Orleans. It’s also home to ACORN International, which Wade Rathke continues to head under a different name.
ACORN brass cooked up a “restitution” plan to allow the Rathkes to pay back a measly $30,000 a year in exchange for secrecy about the deal. ACORN’s lawyers issued a decree to its employees to keep their “yaps” shut. Dale Rathke kept his job and his $38,000 annual salary until the story leaked to donors and board members outside the Rathke circle.
In June 2008, the left-wing Catholic Campaign For Human Development cut off grant money to ACORN “because of questions that arose about financial management, fiscal transparency and organizational accountability of the national ACORN structures.” In November 2008 – ahem, more than a year before the congressional ACORN funding ban was passed – CCHD voted unanimously to extend and make permanent its ban on funding of ACORN organizations. “This decision was made because of serious concerns regarding ACORN’s lack of financial transparency, organizational performance, and questions surrounding political partisanship,” according to Bishop Roger Morin.
Did ACORN’s lawyers call that withdrawal of funding “political grandstanding” and “scapegoating,” too?
The lawsuit over the congressional funding ban is just the latest, desperate legal measure to distract from ACORN’s long-festering ethics and financial scandals. ACORN’s attorneys have sued Giles, O’Keefe, Breitbart, and former ACORN/Project Vote whistleblower Anita MonCrief – and they’ll sue anyone else who gets in the way of rehabilitating the criminal enterprise’s image. It took decades to build up its massive coffers and intricate web of affiliates across the country. It will take months and years to untangle the entire operation. And it will take time, money, and relentless sunshine to dismantle the government-subsidized, partisan racket.
ACORN can never be “reformed.” It is constitutionally corrupt. Sue me.
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Get a real job!
Didn’t know one could sue congress; but if so, good. Discovery should be fun, “We’ll need all your financial records, ACORN!”
Cry me a river, ACORN. I can only hope ACORN, the great fraud, ends up destroyed in every conceivable way.
Acorn says that it is unconstitutional to take back federal money. I say it was unconstitutional to give it to them in the first place. Offset penalties. Case dismissed.
Sweet. The actions of a cornered rat.
Cogs is right. Discovery will be SO FUN
I agree so let all the funding of groups like ACORN cease immediately, let Congress stop taking away our freedom through bogus “health reform”, let the government stop ceasing the private industries of our nation! It is time Congress start following the Constitution instead of using it for toilet paper!
If ACORN was a “center right” organization, you can bet obummer would unleash the DOJ, FBI, and IRS on them. By the time they were done, most of the senior mgt would be in jail. But since it is a FAR left organization, justice will not be served.
I hope there are still enough Republicans in congress with the cajones to force ACORN’s hand. Tell them fine, “but a lot of dirty laundry will be aired before it’s all done”. That would be the last we hear from them.
You know you have been slopping at the federal trough for far too long when you arrogantly go to court to keep the slop coming.
How about some defense contractors suing because their contract was canceled?
How about some seniors suing because their Medicare will be cut under ObamaCare?
What other sectors of federal spending have been cut or pared down (VA health care for veterans) because moeny was siphoned off for these thieves?
These ACORN pigs need to be cut off totally.
Hey Acorn! You want funds from me? Iron my shirts and go make me a sandwich!
moeny=money
I’m not sure if it was Michele our hostess that said it first, but I reiterate; Acorn/SEIU is a criminal enterprise and require a RICO investigation.
we need to de-fund acorn/seiu and all other special interest groups that work against America and want a socialist country…that includes la ratza….
Um, Congress didn’t convict anyone of anything. All they did was stop giving ACORN our money… for a month! But, go ahead. Keep stomping your feet like a brat that didn’t get his cookie today. Santa is watching.
Shows just how wrong funneling tax money to ‘feel good’ projects really is.
Emotional cash never ends well, the government has no business pouring our money into the crybaby industry.
more undercover audio with acorn worker/volunteer….
http://biggovernment.com/2009/11/13/acorn-the-la-story-part-ii-define-community-organizer/
Another
Criminal
Organization
Requiring
Neutering
I agree with that! Mandating citizens to purchase a good or service, like health insurance, is un-Constitutional! The vast majority of laws passed under the auspices of the “Commerce” clause are un-Constitutional. Any law “infringing” on the right of the people to keep and bear arms is un-Constitutional!
Sheesh!
I’ve heard that the de-funding of ACORN was a CYA for Democrats and that it’s not permanent. Which is it? Will they be de-funded for good or will it start up again? Hear Michele Bachman’s statement.
Then, by that logic, there are 90 Congresscritters that favor child prostitution. We know Barney Frank is one of them. He was harboring a prostitution ring in his apartment.
Boy, if we can sue the dc bunch, everyone of us should file suit for what they are doing to the citizens of the Republic.
L
Yeah, let’s sue them if they pass Obamacare.
When the Left makes it’s final power grab and IF they lose more than just a few ACORN activist and flunkies can meet the gallows.Then it shall be time for a major reckoning. If we lose they come for us and the reckoning will be different. But a reckoning is coming.
But it does strike me as odd that the fellows who knock “that Bill of Negative Rights” cling to it so dearly when it suits their purpose.“It’s not the job of Congress to be the judge, jury, and executioner,”. No I guess not-that job should belong to William Ayres perhaps?
Await the reckoning.
We’re on the same page. In Houston both ACORN and SEIU share the same office space and it is about 300 yards from the distinguished Al Green, D-TX district office. He who who bussed in the SEIU thugs that comprised at half of the crowd at his only healthcare townhall.
Include any congressman that covers for them in that RICO suit.
Wow! When left-wing nutjobs won’t fund you things are pretty bad. Maybe Soros will step in and pick up the tab. He has a lot or Euros and Yen floating around these days…
Ralph Gizzip said: “Congresscritters that favor child prostitution. We know Barney Frank is one of them.”
In Barney’s case it is likely just one among many “lifestyle choices” that the pervert approves of.
I hope this means that ACORN has to open its books to public inspection. They are not entitled to our money and they should have to account for every penny. These stupid people only got funds because they acted like thugs.
Please forgive my repeating what I said in an earlier post, but it bears repeating…
We MUST start working NOW to ensure that the 2010 elections are run honestly and that corruption is prevented. ACORN must be removed from the picture. Stop same-day registration and voting. Stop early voting and the practice of “vote early and vote often”. Ensure that only U.S. Citizens are allowed to vote, by requiring voters to show the same documentation required by an Form I-9 Employment Eligibility Verification to start a new job.
For good measure, I’m in favor of purple fingers.