ACORN Decries "Lynching"

Led by Democrats this time, the House of Representatives has voted again to deny any federal funds to ACORN in the wake of its scandal, and ACORN is decrying its public treatment since that scandal broke as a "public lynching" called for by Fox News.

The House passed a continuing resolution today that will keep the federal government up and running through October, and the bill contained language, as reported by The Huffington Post's Ryan Grim, that prohibits any of its funding from going to ACORN, which has received federal funds in the past for non-political work assisting low-income citizens.


In the organization's official response, ACORN Chief Organizer Bertha Lewis suggested the vote violated due process and "flowed out of a Fox News network report, which led the call for a public lynching"; she also said ACORN's critics have been on a "witch hunt" against the organization. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, Grim reports, argued on the House floor today that the language the specifically denied ACORN funding amounted to a bill of attainder--a piece of legislation, prohibited by the Constitution, that stands in for the judicial process and mandates a punishment.

Lewis's full statement:

The punishment here did not follow some criminal or administrative process with basic due process protections.  It flowed out of a Fox News network report, which led the call for a public lynching.  There was no statement of charges and no reference to a judicial or administrative finding of wrongdoing by ACORN.

One unintended -- and positive -- consequence of the witch hunt against ACORN is that it could help rein in the likes of Halliburton and Blackwater and even Wall St.  If the standard is that organizations that have broken the law shouldn't get federal money, then let's set that standard consistently.  There are numerous corporations that have been proven records of malfeasance. For its part -- and although we don't claim perfection in our work for poor and working families -- ACORN has never been convicted of any crime in a court of law - the conservative imagination and the media are another matter.