Rep. Conyers Reverses Stance on ACORN Investigation
By: Kevin Mooney
Commentary Staff Writer
05/06/09 4:53 PM EDT
After listening to detailed testimony on voter fraud allegations and questionable financial transactions connected with ACORN no less than Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called for a possible investigation.
The non-profit activist group formally known as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now is the subject of vote fraud investigations in at least 12 different states. Additional charges were filed in Nevada on Monday.
A dissident group known as the ACORN 8, which includes two former board members of the national group, have also called for federal agents to probe into an embezzlement scheme that involves Dale Rathke, who was once the chief financial officer, and is the brother of Wade Rathke who founded ACORN.
Heather Heidelbaugh, an attorney with the Republican National Lawyers Association, sued ACORN over election law violations last year. Her March testimony made a strong impression on Conyers who received a 100 percent rating from ACORN in its 2006 legislative scorecard.
“It is startling that someone like Conyers, who is very sympathetic to ACORN's policy goals and who has defended the group in the past, is now suddenly considering examining the many wrongdoings of ACORN,” Matthew Vadum, a senior analyst and editor with Capital Research Center observed at the time.
Conyers called the accusations "a pretty serious matter" after listening to Heidelbaugh's testimony.
"I think that it would be something that would be worth our time," he said. "We've never had one person representing ACORN before the committee. ... I think in all fairness we ought to really examine it." [...]
But it would now seem that Conyers has backed off and there will not be a congressional investigation into ACORN’s activities.
In response into inquiries about a possible investigation Conyers’ office released the following statement read on CNN’s Lou Dobbs Tonight Program this past Monday:
“Based on my review of the information regarding the complaints against ACORN, I have concluded that a hearing on this matter appears unwarranted at this time."
There’s a lot of this going around.
As The Examiner reported on Wednesday Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) plans to strip out an anti-ACORN provision Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) succeeded in inserting in the proposed Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act that could be voted on by the House today or Thursday.
Bachmann’s amendment was unanimously approved by Frank’s committee in a voice vote last week. It would block organizations that have been indicted for voter registration or vote fraud from receiving housing counseling grants and legal assistance grants.
The Bachmann prohibition would apply only to the proposed mortgage reform legislation, and would not change ACORN’s ability to receive funds under either the stimulus program or 2010 budget.
Frank said his panel’s approval of the Bachmann amendment was a mistake and that he had not carefully reviewed its language when he previously voted yes.
“I did not read it carefully, and it was in the last minute that the amendment was accepted,” Frank said. “It is a deeply flawed amendment and I am opposed to it. Banning people from possible participation in government programs based on an indictment is a violation of the basic principles of due process.”
Frank plans to offer another amendment to the bill on the House floor that would allow non-profits that have been indicted to receive grants under the legislation so long as they have not been convicted.
Bachmann said Frank’s amendment would “eviscerate the meaning” of her original amendment.
