California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is calling for a full investigation into the California chapters of ACORN.
The governor sent a letter to California Attorney General Jerry Brown yesterday urging him to investigate ACORN’s California activities. In the letter, he referred to “news stories regarding the ACORN organization that have concerned me greatly.”
Schwarzenegger was motivated to send the letter after viewing a video released by BigGovernment.com showing a San Diego worker giving tips on how to smuggle underage girls into the country.
ACORN has come under fire recently after workers in numerous cities were caught on tape giving tax advice to Conservative activists James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles of BigGovernment.com who posed as a prostitute and pimp.
Barack Obama has strong ties to the organization dating back to the early 90s. As a Chicago attorney, he once represented ACORN in court. And last year he donated $800,000 to the group to help him “get out the vote” during his campaign for president.
In the video series, ACORN workers were overly enthusiastic about helping the Caucasian couple circumvent the law and evade taxes, but low-income blacks — who ACORN is supposed to represent — complained that ACORN workers virtually ignored them:
Outside the Sacramento office, Ruby Bradley said she was highly skeptical of the organization. She said she once applied for help with a housing loan with ACORN, but never got a response.
“I think it was poor business,” Bradley said.That complaint was echoed by Demario Anthony of Sacramento, who said his aunt’s application was ignored.
“She stopped dealing with them,” Anthony said. “We asked what happened, and she said she didn’t want to talk about it.” Read more…
