Big Government Exclusive: “ACORN Legal Memo Confirms Depths of Troubles”
Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on October 1, 2009
Political cartoon encore…
Andrew Breitbart’s new website Big Government continues to deliver the goods on the corruption of ACORN…
Matthew Vadum at Big Government on ACORN’s escalating legal problems:
ACORN’s lawyer warned ACORN 15 months ago to begin fixing its massive internal problems or face certain catastrophe. It chose to do nothing.
The advice from Elizabeth Kingsley of Harmon, Curran, Spielberg Eisenberg LLP came in the form of an eerily prophetic legal memo to ACORN dated June 19, 2008, the day before ACORN’s national board fired disgraced founder Wade Rathke…
The memo is a kind of Holy Grail for ACORN researchers. One source of mine keeps a copy in a safety deposit box. I’ve lost track of how many people have asked me over the last year if I knew how to get ahold of it. One source told me that there are many people who would “kill” to gain possession of it. This is a bit of an exaggeration perhaps, but not much.
Go to Big Government to see the notorious legal memo.
Portion of Vadum’s in-depth article at American Spectator, ACORN’s Prophetic Lawyer:
“But whether you try to implement some or all of these recommendations, there must be someone committed to follow-up. There must be a review mechanism, and a means of holding people accountable after any final decisions are made. If you do not make some hard choices now and ensure they are carried out, they almost certainly will be made for you.”
– attorney Elizabeth Kingsley of Harmon, Curran, Spielberg Eisenberg LLP, in a prophetic legal memo to ACORN dated June 19, 2008, the day before ACORN’s national board ousted ACORN founder organizer Wade Rathke.ACORN’s lawyer warned ACORN 15 months ago to begin fixing its massive internal problems or face certain catastrophe. ACORN didn’t listen. It let the problems fester….
…The Kingsley memo paints a picture of a once-proud activist conglomerate in utter meltdown and confirms some of the most serious allegations about ACORN now being heard on Capitol Hill.
The problems within ACORN, she admits, are systemic.
Kingsley explains that her concerns fall into four major categories: “respect for corporate integrity, the necessary separation between different types of political work, the niceties of 501(c)(3) tax compliance and accounting for those funds, and a big-picture question about organizational capacity.” She goes to great pains explaining that she is not trying to single any person out, “but to point to systemic institutional concerns.”
Americans who follow the news know that the activities of the ACORN network, a tangled mess of interlocking directorates and affiliated tax-exempt groups that routinely swap seven-figure checks, have long cried out for a probe under federal racketeering laws. The undercover prostitution sting videos that began popping up at BigGovernment.com in mid-September made America intensely interested in ACORN for the first time. While the mainstream media is now covering ACORN, kind of, sort of, no longer can ACORN be said to be the exclusive preserve of Fox News Channel and conservative talk show hosts.
In her reference manual for left-wing activists, The Practical Progressive, Erica Payne reports ACORN’s total 2008 budget was $50 million. Surely that figure is too low.
The network has taken in at least $107 million in donations and $53 million in federal funds since 1993, yet it owes millions of dollars in back taxes and is eligible for up to $8.5 billion in federal funding this year.
No one really knows how big the entire ACORN network’s budget is. One of the reasons is that tracking housing and community development grants administered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is difficult. HUD often distributes the money to states and localities, which then allot the funds to many different nonprofit groups. Getting a total financial picture would require enlisting an army of Freedom of Information Act requesters.
Other ACORN reading:
US News & World Report: ACORN Story Shows How Internet Reporting Is Beating the New York Times
Maura Flynn, Big Government: ACORN Founder Wade Rathke: “There Is a Different Culture”
Kevin Kane, Big Government: ACORN’s Tax Problems
Publius, Big Government: Bertha Lewis: Help ACORN, Vote Obama! and ACORN Tactics Revealed in Discovered Documents
Goodtimepolitics: ACORN Plot Recovered From Computers Abandoned By ACORN workers
Citizen Wells: ACORN, Nevada corruption, Harry reid blocks investigation, Las Vegas Review Journal, September 25, 2009, Clark County, Rampant fraud, ACORN corruption
Kyle Olson, Big Government: ACORN ‘Advisory’ Committe Has Huge Stake in Success of Group
Frugal Café Blog Zone: ACORN in Las Vegas: Voter Registration Fraud Charges, “Blackjack” Bonus Plan (video)
Yet Another ACORN Problem: Cease and Desist Orders in Pennsylvania… Order Dated 2007 and Why Did FEMA Award $1 Million ‘Fire Prevention’ Grant to ACORN? and ACORN’s Brazen $7 Million Lawsuit Against Filmmakers O’Keefe, Giles, & Breitbart Has Little Support (video) and ACORN: “We’ll Help You Get Away with Stuff” — Jay Leno, Bill O’Reilly, & Dennis Miller Weigh In (video) and ‘Big Government’s’ Breitbart Lets Major TV News Media Have It for Lying, Ignoring, or Distorting ACORN Child Hooker-Tax Fraud Scandal (video)
Anita MonCrief: Schumer, Gutierrez and Waters Honored for Governing the “ACORN Way” at Anniversary Celebration
Publius, Big Government: Is Breitbart More Powerful than ACORN?
Michelle Malkin: Indoctrination Watch: How your tax dollars are training students to be union organizers
Sen. David Vitter (R-LA), Big Government: FEMA Grant to ACORN is Offensive
Wall Street Journal: Bank Pulls Back From Acorn Work
Capitol Confidential, Big Government: Exclusive: FEMA Awards Fire Prevention Grant to ACORN
Bret Jacobson, Big Government: SEIU’s Texas Roadshow: Will They ‘Kill’ Your Company?
Riehl World View: Is Franken ACORN’s Man In The Senate?
Tom Steward, Big Government: An Early ACORN Whistleblower: Karen Inman
Macsmind: Let’s Ramp Up Investigation into All the Organizations of the Left
Big Government: ACORN’s Working Family of Democratic Socialists
Hot Air: Breitbart: I thought Bertha Lewis was grateful that we exposed ACORN’s corruption and War: ACORN sues Breitbart, O’Keefe, and Giles and Dig deep: Hannah Giles defense fund launches and Media Matters dishonest editing in support of their “smear” argument exposed and ACORN chief: Targeting a minority group with a prostitution sting is racist or something and Is ACORN operating in Maryland illegally? and Conyers’s wife cops plea to federal bribery charges — as Conyers drops probe of ACORN
Kristina Rasmussen, Big Government: Illinois Grant to ACORN Housing Under Review
Wellsy’s World: Disgrace: ACORN sues undercover journalists
Big Hollywood: ACORN Video Investigation
Scared Monkeys: Why Isn’t President Barack Obama Interested in Child Sex Slaves and Human Trafficking or Find it Important?
About the author
Here’s another prophetic legal memo: http://usjf.net/?p=1292
“The Salvation of the State is Watchfulness of the Citizen”
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