Mullis to IRS: Pull ACORN’s tax-exempt status
January 13, 2009 at 11:32 am by Thomas Wheatley in NewsState Sen. Jeff Mullis, R-Chickamauga, filed legislation today that urges the Internal Revenue Service to revoke the tax-exempt status of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN.
If you recall, the grassroots organization pissed off cable news pundits and right-wing Internet trolls during the 2008 presidential election for alleged voter fraud.
From the state Senate press office:
“An organization that chooses to undermine the integrity of our nation’s election process should not be entitled to tax exemption benefits,” said Sen. Mullis. “The excessive amount of evidence against ACORN engaging in fraudulent activity demands that the organization to be held accountable for taking advantage of hardworking taxpayers, and I call on the IRS to ensure that justice is executed in this case.”
The grassroots organization runs a large voter registration drive focused on minority and low-income communities, and during the 2008 presidential election came under fire for submitting voter registrations to 11 states with false information. ACORN has been accused of submitting the names of deceased persons and the names of 15 members of the Dallas Cowboys on registration forms in Nevada. In Ohio, one person stated that he signed 73 voter registration applications over a five-month span through ACORN, and in Connecticut, ACORN submitted a registration card for a seven-year-old girl that contained a false birth date.
Sen. Mullis is calling on the IRS and the Secretary of the Treasury to launch a full-scale investigation into ACORN’s fraudulent activities, and is urging the IRS to remove the organization’s tax exemption status.
January 13th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
Well, this is going to put a crimp in the Senator’s grandstanding on last year’s nakedly partisan attacks on ACORN’s successful registration drive that helped 1.3 million people complete voter registration applications, but he should know that ACORN is not a tax-exempt organization (also known as a 501c3 organzation) and therefore the IRS has no jurisdiction to investigate ACORN on the basis of violating said status.
It’s kind of interesting how a state senator manages to screw up the most basic piece of research in his rush to condemn an organization that seeks to bring new voters into America’s democracy – one of the most patriotic acts imaginable.
I hope he represents his constituents with more diligence than he does when engaging in baseless partisan attacks.
January 13th, 2009 at 3:30 pm
isn’t ACORN required by law to turn in EVERY voter registration form that someone gives them?
and doesn’t ACORN then flag the suspicious forms?
so can someone tell me what all the hoopla is about?
January 13th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Mullis needs to wake up, look at the the big irrelevant ‘(R)’ attached to the end of his name and then shut up.
January 13th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
It is about widespread corruption in ACORN’s practices.
ACORN is a tax-exempt non-profit in many, if not all, states in which it operates. ACORN is apparently not, however, subject to political restrictions that many other groups face. That is why groups like Project VOTE “partner” with it for get out the vote projects.
BTW, Project VOTE says that ACORN only signed up about 450,000 new voters in their project, not the 1.3 million often reported.
January 13th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
For those interested, simply Google ACORN vote and corruption to see what this is all about.
January 13th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
As chair of the senate transportation cmte, wouldn’t Jeff’s time be better spent on a forensic audit of the Georgia Department of Transportation?
damn dingbats everywhere you look up there…
http://www.legis.state.ga.us/legis/2005_06/senate/mullisbio.htm
January 13th, 2009 at 7:14 pm
Folks,
Do your basic research. ACORN is NOT a c3 organization in ANY of the states in which it operates in and it NEVER has been. It IS a non-profit, but it is NOT tax-exempt.
This is the specific reason why it is not subject to the same kinds of restrictions that tax-exempt groups face.
On the numbers: Project Vote and ACORN partnered in a voter registration drive that helped over 1.3 million people complete voter registration applications. Like most other registration drives, these were not all new voters. About 1/3rd were new voters. About 1/3rd were people who were previously registered voters but who had moved, necessitating re-registration in order to vote. Combined that was about 900,000 people who would not have been able to vote without the VR drive.
The remmaining 1/3rd consisted of the following groups: people already registered at their current address but wanted to ensure they were properly registered (of the 33% this was about 25 percentage points). Of the remaining 8 percentage points, about 6.5% were spoiled applications: unsigned, bad handwriting, incompletely filled out, etc. That leaves 1.5% that were “suspicious” or about 60,000 out of 1.3 million spread out over 70 metro regions. Some of these were fake cards submitted by ACORN employees trying to get paid for not doing the work, defrauding both ACORN and the system.
All cards were turned in, in compliance with many state laws that REQUIRE all cards gathered to be turned in. (Do you want ACORN or the GOP deciding who is and is not a registered voter?)
All of the cards were subject to strict verification procedures including 3 attempts to contact registrants to verify their information.
All of the cards were turned in in three bundles: verified cards, incomplete cards, and “suspicious” cards.
The reason you even know about these cards is because ACORN flagged them in the first place and notified the proper authorities.
ACORN’s overall error rate (6.5%) is lower than the error rate for every single DMV in the United States, but you don’t see them accused of fraud, now do you?
These attacks were widespread and nakedly partisan because the people making them were threatened by 900,000 of the “wrong” kinds of voters.
Just because you can Google pages of accusations against ACORN doesn’t make the allegations true.
And, it is worth noting, in every single case of former ACORN workers being charged with fraud, ACORN cooperated completely, often turning the worker in first, and applauds the prosecutions.