There are only two kinds of people (and groups) in America: tax payers and tax eaters.  ACORN falls in the latter category and even worse, they're tax delinquents.

In fact, they go out of their way to avoid paying taxes.  ACORN has had several liens filed against it by the IRS for unpaid taxes.  According to Ballotpedia.org, a lien of $547,312 was filed March 10, 2008 against ACORN's New Orleans property.  Four days later, March 14, another lien was filed for $132,997. 

So when they say everyone should pay their fair share, it would be good if they practiced what they preached.  The irony is not lost that of the many website domains ACORN owns, one is taxripoffs.com.  In fact, which you go to it, it forwards you to ACORN.org!

Nevertheless, taxpayers deserve to know where their tax dollars are going.

"Government CPAs" only, please

When ACORN "chief organizer" Bertha Lewis told Fox News' Bill O'Reilly he couldn't look at ACORN's books because his investigators weren't "government CPAs," we had a hunch they didn't want the public to know the truth. Organizations that raise their money from private sources and the private sector have a right to privacy with respect to their finances, in our opinion. But when they obtain public funding--our tax dollars--there ought to be a higher level of accountability. So when Lewis felt no need to be accountable to us, those funding a major portion of her questionable operation, we decided to do a little digging. 

First of all, it is almost impossible to pinpoint funds flowing to ACORN’s 200+ organizations.  Nonetheless, we have been able to identify funds to ‘ACORN’ in general.

Labor Unions

Many labor unions are required to file LM-2 reports with the federal Department of Labor.  Reporting requirements have been eased by the Obama administration, and it is likely this type of information will no longer be available.

Nevertheless, what we found was sadly unsurprising. Given the close public alliance with SEIU, ACORN received a substantial amount of funding from them, for such things as "support for political activities," "ex-offender outreach," and "hospital accountability." 

The SEIU has an unusually close relationship with ACORN.  Wade Rathke appears on SEIU Local 100’s financial reports.   Check out the SEIU 100 contact information, from a March 2004 SEIU newsletter:

The National Education Association gave funds for "nonpartisan voter registration."  The New York City Teachers union, an affiliateof the American Federation of Teachers, gave over $1 million for things such as "cash bulk registration," whatever that is.  In all, ACORNcracked.com has identified over $7.6 million going from labor unions to ACORN from 2005 to 2008.

 

The NEA’s alliance with ACORN appears to be growing.  The nation’s largest teachers’ union recently held a gala fundraiser at its Washington, DC headquarters.  MonCrief posted the invitation on her site.  Click on the small version to see it enlarged. See the back here.

 

See the full list of union contributions below.  Each LM-2 report, from which this information was gleaned, is linked in the chart. [PDF here]

 

Other LM-2s: SEIU 2009 :: SEIU 1199 2009

Support also comes from corporations, which we believe are the result of shakedowns, as we describe on the Agenda & Tactics page.

The Capital Research Center published a thorough exposé on ACORN in 2008.  It identified millions of dollars from financial institutions to ACORN groups.  These are some of the same financial institutions ACORN has picketed, harassed, and invaded, according to CRC.