Bertha Lewis

Maryland's ACORN Chapter Closes Operations

ACORN conferenceAs far as operations in Maryland go, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, is no more. On Monday the group's former state co-chairwoman, Sonja Merchant-Jones, announced that the group has shut down all of its offices and in the foreseeable future would not operate under a new name. The announcement is a coda to the wave of bad publicity befalling the parent organization since last September following the airing of videos filmed by a young conservative activist couple, James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles, pretending to be a pimp and a prostitute. The hidden camera sting, posted on the Web and Fox News Channel, caught ACORN office employees in Baltimore and other U.S. cities giving advice on how to skirt around the law in order to obtain small business loans. 

ACORN Local Chapters Declare Independence; Makeover Appears Cosmetic

ACORN officialsIt's hard to imagine the scandal-plagued Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, suddenly developing a case of contrition or modesty. So the raft of reports racing across the blogosphere today that the New Orleans-based nationwide radical nonprofit network is on the brink of dissolving itself should be taken with a degree of skepticism. The move may be little more than savvy public relations. "ACORN has dissolved as a national structure of state organizations," remarked an unnamed senior official close to the organization. "Consistent with what the internal recommendations have been, each of the states are developing plans for reconstitution, independence and self-sufficiency." The source added that the splinter organizations "will be constituted under new banners and new bylaws and new governance.

Federal Judge in N.Y. Protects ACORN Government Funding

ACORNRadicals long have used the judicial system as an effective last-ditch weapon to circumvent decisions by the legislative branch. This past Friday, one of their leading lights, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, better known as ACORN, showed the advantages of having a sympathetic federal judge in one's corner. This past Friday, U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon of the Eastern District of New York, a Clinton appointee, issued a preliminary injunction against the recent congressional cutoff of funds for the New Orleans-based nonprofit network.

Harshbarger Whitewashes ACORN Lawbreaking

Bertha LewisThe Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, has a justly earned reputation this decade for voter registration fraud, embezzlement and other illegal acts. Yet according to an eagerly-awaited internal assessment released yesterday, the radical nationwide nonprofit network's main, if not sole, problem is inadequate employee training and oversight. The audit, supervised by former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger, had been prompted by employees of ACORN offices in different cities caught in a video sting this summer giving advice on how to hide assets and falsify loan documents. The New Orleans-based "anti-poverty" organization and its defenders see vindication. Critics see a whitewash, a set of rigged conclusions. The latter view is hard to avoid.

GOP Candidate Scozzafava, Husband Have Ties to Union-Backed ACORN Front

ACORN conferenceThe political blogosphere has been exploding these past couple weeks over a special congressional election in an unlikely portion of upstate New York. A key reason is the connections between the Republican candidate, Dede Scozzafava, and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, a virtual adjunct to the more reprehensible sectors of the Democratic Party. An ACORN front group, the Working Families Party (WFP), on October 9 formally endorsed the Democratic opponent in this tight three-person race. But the WFP has endorsed Scozzafava more than once in the past. And a major reason is that her husband, Ron McDougall, is an organizer for one of the unions that created the party back in the late Nineties. Scozzafava has yet to repudiate either ACORN or the WFP.

ACORN Embezzlement Totaled $5 Million, Internal Audit Asserts

ACORN logoWhere there's smoke, there's fire. And in the case of the radical nonprofit network, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, the fire is more than five times as bad as originally reported. According to results from an internal audit released yesterday, top ACORN members embezzled around $5 million during its years under the helm of founder Wade Rathke. That's well above the roughly $950,000 that Rathke's brother, former ACORN chief financial officer Dale, reportedly stole during 1999-2000 - and that Wade Rathke ordered covered up lest the incident create bad publicity. Fittingly, current ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis claims the latest allegations to be "completely false."

Obama Political Director Gaspard Worked as Operative for ACORN Fronts, SEIU

Patrick Gaspard photoWith each passing week, the shadowy radical political network that has made possible the career of President Barack Obama is being dragged into the sunlight. And almost all paths of this network, directly or indirectly, lead to or from the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), a virtual corruption machine of the Democratic Party Left. One of the more disturbing aspects of the Obama-ACORN connection is that the White House political affairs director is one Patrick Gaspard.

Justice Department Inspector General Opens Investigation of ACORN

Rep. Lamar SmithThe IRS isn't the only federal agency alarmed over the potentially criminal activities of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN. At the start of this week, the U.S. Department of Justice announced its Office of Inspector General was initiating a probe of the radical New Orleans-based nonprofit nationwide network. The move was in response to a request by several members of Congress, led by Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Tex., for aggressive oversight of the hard Left organization, which over the years has been a key cog in the Democratic Party and especially in the rise of the political career of Barack Obama. "It is clear that ACORN has fostered a culture of corruption," said Rep. Smith, Ranking Republican on the House Judiciary Committee. "With investigations of ACORN now occurring in 20 states, it is time for the FBI to open up a full-scale investigation into possible criminal conduct by ACORN."

IRS Severs Ties to ACORN in Wake of Scandals, Tax Liens

ACORN logoThe Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, is fast becoming radioactive to any organization contemplating doing business (or further business) with it. Federal agencies are no exception to the growing list of entities that recently have dropped their ties to the New Orleans-based nonprofit network. The Internal Revenue Service announced yesterday that it no longer would include ACORN as a partner in its Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program.

New York ACORN Front Group Based in New Orleans Gets Taxpayer Money

ACORN logoOne of the defining hallmarks of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, is its propensity for using front organizations to advance its goals. The New Orleans-based nonprofit organization has fully 360 subsidiary and adjunct groups. Lately, one of its affiliates, a misleadingly-named nonprofit entity called New York Agency for Community Affairs, Inc. (NYACA), has been at the center of attention. A recent probe by a consortium of New York City newspapers shows NYACA thus far in this year alone has received hundreds of thousands of dollars from New York state and local taxpayers for political campaign services.

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