ACORN 2009 undercover videos controversy
Encyclopedia
The ACORN 2009 undercover videos controversy refers to the news media and political uproar following the release of videos in 2009 purporting to show encounters between a young couple and workers in several offices of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now
(ACORN), where the ACORN workers appeared to advise the couple in how to hide prostitution activities and avoid taxes. The videos, which were recorded secretly by conservative activists Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe
(the "young couple"), were released on Fox News and the website BigGovernment.com from September into November 2009. They quickly generated widespread, negative publicity for ACORN, a non-profit organization involved in voter registration, community organizing and acted as an advocate for low- and moderate-income people for nearly 40 years. The US Census Bureau and the IRS ended contracts with the organization, and the US Congress voted to suspend its funding to ACORN. Soon ACORN also lost most of its private funding, despite several independent investigations that by December 2009 began to reveal no criminal activity by ACORN staff existed. ACORN filed for Chapter 7
liquidation on November 2, 2010, effectively closing the organization,
In the videos, Giles posed as a prostitute
and O'Keefe posed as her boyfriend, apparently in "pimp" costume, (footage of him in costume was recorded separately, and OKeefe appeared at the ACORN offices in conservative street clothes). They visited ACORN offices in numerous cities, and created situations to secretly record. They later edited the videos to show low-level ACORN employees in eight cities appearing to provide advice to Giles and O'Keefe on how to avoid taxes and detection by the authorities with regard to their plans to engage in tax evasion
, human smuggling and child prostitution. O'Keefe explained in September 2009 that he "targeted ACORN for the same reasons that the political right does: its massive voter registration drives."
An investigation was completed by the California Attorney General
in April 2010. In exchange for granting immunity to O'Keefe and Giles, the office acquired all the raw videos shot at three California ACORN offices. Its comparison of the raw videos with the released versions found that the published videos had been heavily edited
to misrepresent the workers and the situations. In December 2009, March and June of 2010, independent investigations by the former Massachusetts Attorney General, the US Attorney of Brooklyn, and the US Government Accountability Office
found no evidence that ACORN workers had misused government funds or participated in the criminal activities represented. But, ACORN was effectively destroyed by then.
On December 7, 2009, the former Massachusetts Attorney General
, after an independent external investigation of ACORN, found the videos that had been released appeared to have been edited, "in some cases substantially". He found no evidence of criminal conduct by ACORN employees, but concluded that ACORN had poor management practices. On March 1, 2010, the District Attorney
's office for Brooklyn determined that the videos were "heavily edited" and concluded that there was no criminal wrongdoing by the ACORN staff in the videos from the Brooklyn ACORN office. On April, 1, 2010, an investigation by the California Attorney General
found the videos from Los Angeles, San Diego and San Bernardino also to be "heavily edited", and the investigation did not find evidence of criminal conduct on the part of ACORN employees. On June 14, 2010, the US Government Accountability Office
(GAO) released its findings which showed that ACORN evidenced no sign that it, or any of its related organizations, mishandled any federal money they had received.
The Congressional resolutions to eliminate funding to ACORN were nullified by a federal court ruling that the measure was an unconstitutional bill of attainder
. But, on August 13, 2010, a federal appeals court reversed that ruling and upheld the act that cut off federal funding for ACORN.
(ACORN). At the time, Giles was an undergraduate studying journalism at Florida International University
. Following the release of videos and extensive media coverage, she dropped out of college to "pursue demands to keep up with public appearances and job offers". Giles and O'Keefe first met when she called him to discuss her idea; together they spent $1,300 to accomplish what Washington Post reporters called a "Mission to Fell ACORN". Giles was lauded by conservative commentators for what they characterized as a series of investigative encounters at the prominent community organization.
James E. O'Keefe III (born June 28, 1984) is an American
activist-filmmaker who came to national attention in the United States in September 2009 with the release of his ACORN undercover videos. O'Keefe worked for about a year at the Leadership Institute
, led by Morton Blackwell
. O'Keefe has described his politics as "progressive radical". He has expressed admiration for the philosophies of British writer G.K. Chesterton and Soviet dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
. He has made additional secret videos since then, also found to have been heavily edited to misrepresent his subjects, or present them in the worst light. On January 26, 2010, O'Keefe was arrested with three colleagues, including Robert Flanagan, the son of the acting US Attorney of the Eastern District of Louisiana, and initially charged with a federal felony for attempting to maliciously interfere with the office telephone system of US Senator Mary Landrieu
and to tape conversations of her and her staff. They later pled guilty to misdemeanor charges and were given minor sentences including community service.
, Washington D.C., Brooklyn, San Bernardino
, San Diego, Philadelphia
, Los Angeles
, and Miami. Giles dressed as a prostitute, while O'Keefe wore white khakis with a blue dress shirt and/or tie and claimed to be her boyfriend. Giles and O'Keefe recorded the encounters using hidden cameras and pretended to be seeking advice on how to run an illegal business which included the use of underage girls in the sex trade
.
, Washington D.C., Brooklyn, San Bernardino
, and San Diego were released between September 10 and September 17, 2009, and were used to launch Andrew Breitbart
's BigGovernment.com website. Unedited transcripts were also released on the site.
In the videos, O'Keefe included segments in which he wore a fur coat, top hat, sunglasses, and wielded a cane, giving viewers, including the media, the impression that he had dressed that way when he visited the ACORN offices and spoke to its workers. As part of the deception and distortion of the released videos, O'Keefe added that portion as a lead-in, but he was dressed professionally during his ACORN visits. He never revealed himself on camera in the visits to the ACORN offices.
In the Baltimore office, the released video lets viewers hear O'Keefe saying that he and Giles were bringing up thirteen girls from El Salvador
"like 15" years of age to live in their house and work as prostitutes "just to get them on their feet so they can do this type of thing". Giles remarks, "they are kind of dependent". Although the Baltimore ACORN staffer pointed out their plans were illegal, after O'Keefe says, "we are going to be putting a roof over [their] head," the ACORN employee states, "well then you know what you can always claim them as dependents". Later, the employee says, "you are gonna use three of them they are gonna be under 16 so you is eligible to get child tax credit and additional child tax credit". When O'Keefe asks, "what if they are going to be making money because they are performing tricks too?," the employee replies, "but if they making money and they are underage, then you shouldn't be letting anybody know anyway." The Baltimore employees were fired by ACORN after the video was released.
In the Washington D.C. office, Giles and O'Keefe ask about how to account for Giles' anticipated prostitution income on tax forms. Giles asks, "is there a way I can make up two years of tax returns?" The ACORN employee replies, "no you can't make it up", but tells Giles that she could form a business and state that she provides a service. The employee says, "you can have a business. She's not going to put down that she's doing prostitution", and "you don't have to sit back and tell people what it is you do". Giles later tells an ACORN employee that she will be giving the money earned from prostitution to O'Keefe. The employee says, "when the police ask you – you don't know where it's coming from".
In the Brooklyn office, Giles and O'Keefe tell a loan counselor they want to buy a house, and that an abusive pimp is "aggressively" pursuing Giles. She "wanted to leave because it is scary being subjected to a huge man who has control over your life". The ACORN counselor advises her "you get a tin if [he] is going to come beat you... you get a tin and bury it down in there and you put the money right in and you put grass over it and you don't tell a single soul". When discussing getting a house and Giles' earnings, O'Keefe says that Giles is very honest and an ACORN counselor replies, "honest is not going to get you the house that is why you probably been denied cause you probably going in saying". Another stated to Giles, "you can't say what you do for a living". For tax and banking purposes, and to establish a legitimate income and credit history, Giles was told she needed to start saying she was a "freelancer". The ACORN employee also suggested that Giles open two accounts at separate banks, depositing no more than $500 each a week to ensure few eyebrows are raised.
In the San Bernardino office, ACORN employee Tresa Kaelke told O'Keefe and Giles they could classify the underage brothel as a "group home" to avoid detection; she suggested the pair "invest in a line of vitamins" to disguise the location's true purpose. Later, Kaelke stated she believed the activists were joking and made a variety of absurd or joking statements to them. She said they were "somewhat entertaining, but they weren't even good actors". Office supervisor Christina Spach said Kaelke "pretended to cooperate with O'Keefe and Giles because she feared for her safety". Kaelke responded to the pair's requests for help setting up a child-prostitution ring on the video by claiming to be an ex-prostitute and exclaiming, "Heidi Fleiss
is my hero!" The California Attorney General's investigation of Kaelke determined that "none of her claims" on the video was true, that "she was playing along with what she perceived as a joke", and there was "no evidence she had ever engaged in prostitution". According to CNN, the filmmakers released a transcript of their discussion with Kaelke that included a comment left out of the originally released tape in which Kaelke said that ACORN would have nothing to do with their prostitution business. Kaelke said that her supervisor "would shoot this down faster than a bat out of hell", but advised the couple to conceal the prostitution business by calling it a massage parlor. Kaelke was fired by ACORN after the videos were released.
In the San Diego office, edited video showed ACORN employee Juan Carlos Vera telling O'Keefe he had "contacts" in "Tijuana
" to help get underage girls across the border. But, after the discussion with O'Keefe, Vera reported O'Keefe's fabricated plan for human smuggling to police. Vera was fired for what ACORN called "unacceptable conduct." Vera had said he tried to help the fake prostitute because she said that she needed to escape her controlling pimp. On July 8, 2010, after the AG's Report confirmed that he had contacted the police to try to thwart the couple's smuggling plan, Vera filed a civil suit in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California against O'Keefe and Giles for recording him without his permission, which was a violation of California law.
said on Fox News on September 20, 2009, "[i]n a way, this was good for us, so what it did was show up to us what weaknesses we have, and we have moved swiftly... in order to correct that." She said that after viewing the tapes, she had fired all the employees featured and had begun a comprehensive external investigation. As ACORN learned more from its employees of what had taken place, it called the videos "false" and "defamatory." A spokesman accused O'Keefe of dubbing the audio on the videos. On September 23, 2009, ACORN filed suit in a Baltimore court against the filmmakers, citing "extreme emotional distress" of the ACORN workers and violation of two-party consent recording laws. It later withdrew the suit.
conference. They claimed it was to show they had received help there, after an ACORN spokesman had said that the pair had been asked to leave the Philadelphia office. The Washington Post "obtained a July 24 police report that showed police were called when O’Keefe and Giles attempted their sting at ACORN’s Philadelphia offices—and that the couple were escorted out of those offices." Susan Kinzie of The Washington Post noted that "the heavily edited footage includes audio of the two conservatives but none of the ACORN Housing Corp. worker's responses to their questions." Junette Marcano, a board member of Philadelphia ACORN, said, "This is a targeted assault to disenfranchise our members because . . . the right-wing agenda is to stop us from empowering people of low and moderate incomes. When you make the poor powerful, the powerful feel threatened."
Carol Leonnig, a Washington Post staff writer who attended the press conference, said in an interview that day on Fox News that, in explaining why the audio portion did not include the worker's responses, O'Keefe said, "on the one hand, the pair are concerned about the legal ramifications." O'Keefe claimed secondly "that the tape battery died." Commenting on the Philadelphia video, Leonnig said, "...when you go to this office, and you see this tape, I don't think he's got the goods to say that ACORN lied." Both Giles and O'Keefe declined to answer questions after the release of the October video.
reported that ACORN was on the verge of filing for bankruptcy; 15 of the group's 30 state chapters had disbanded over the past six months, and other chapters (including the largest, in New York and California) had renamed themselves and severed all ties to the national organization. Two unnamed ACORN officials told the Times that the following weekend, a teleconference was planned to discuss a bankruptcy filing; "private donations from foundations to Acorn [had] all but evaporated." The federal government had ended contracts with the group related to organizing counts in urban areas for the Census and work for the IRS. "[L]ong before the activist videos delivered what may become the final blow, the organization was dogged for years by financial problems and accusations of fraud." "That 20-minute video ruined 40 years of good work", said Sonja Merchant-Jones, former co-chairwoman of ACORN's recently closed Maryland chapter. "But if the organization had confronted its own internal problems, it might not have been taken down so easily."
On March 22, 2010, National ACORN spokesman Kevin Whelan says the organization's board decided to close remaining state affiliates and field offices by April 1 because of falling revenues. On April 20, the ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis
reported that ACORN was "still alive. We're limping along. We're on life support." Lewis said that ACORN's annual budget had been reduced from $25 million to $4 million, and that its staff of 350 to 600 people had been reduced to four. Lewis explained the controversy had left a stain on ACORN, "sort of like a scarlet letter." It had forced the group to spend money to respond to "one investigation after another".
Barack Obama
stated the video content was "certainly inappropriate and deserves to be investigated". ACORN's partnership in the 2010 United States Census was terminated on September 11, 2009. The United States Senate
voted to exclude ACORN from federal funding on September 14, and the House of Representatives voted 345-75 to eliminate federal funding to ACORN on September 17. John Boehner
, the Republican leader of the House, introduced HR 3571 the "Defund ACORN Act" on September 15, and Rep. Darrell Issa
moved to incorporate that bill as an amendment to the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009 (HR 3221). Both resolutions were later nullified in a federal court
ruling by Judge Nina Gershon
that the measures were an unconstitutional bill of attainder
. On August 13, 2010, however, a federal appeals court reversed that decision, and upheld the Congressional resolutions that cut off federal funding for ACORN.
On September 23, the Internal Revenue Service
removed ACORN from its volunteer tax-assistance program
. On September 24, the US Treasury Department's Inspector General announced it would initiate a broader probe into "the government's oversight of tax-exempt organizations like ACORN when they engage in political activities".
, an attorney from the Proskauer Rose
firm and a former Massachusetts Attorney General. On September 16, Bertha Lewis
, ACORN's CEO
, froze admission to all of ACORN's service programs and instituted a review committee to implement organizational reforms. The independent external investigation found that while some of the counsel given by employees and volunteers was "unprofessional and inappropriate", the videos that had been released appeared to have been edited, "in some cases substantially", and ACORN employees had taken no illegal actions.
began an investigation on September 15, 2009 to ensure that state grants given to ACORN were properly spent. The New York City Council suspended all ACORN grants while the Brooklyn District Attorney
's Office conducted an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the videos. On March 1, 2010, the District Attorney
's office for Brooklyn determined that the videos were "heavily edited" and concluded that there was no criminal wrongdoing by the ACORN staff in the videos from the Brooklyn ACORN office.
's office opened an investigation "into the controversy surrounding videos that purportedly show members of community organizing group ACORN giving advice on how to open a brothel."
On April 1, 2010, Attorney General Brown announced the office's findings, based on its review of the three full, unedited videotapes recorded in the California offices of ACORN. The AG had granted O'Keefe and Giles immunity from prosecution in exchange for the raw videotapes. Brown noted that the terms of the exchange did not exempt O'Keefe or Giles from being sued separately by the ACORN members filmed in the videos. Citing the 1967 Invasion of Privacy Act, Brown's report stated that "an application of these principles to the facts presented here strongly suggests that O'Keefe and Giles violated state privacy laws and provides fair warning to them and others that this type of activity can be prosecuted in California."
Brown criticized O'Keefe for acting to damage ACORN, rather than as a journalist trying to report a story from the facts. In his report, Brown said, "The video releases were heavily edited to feature only the worst or most inappropriate statements of the various ACORN employees and to omit some of the most salient statements by O'Keefe and Giles. Each of the ACORN employees recorded in California was a low level employee whose job was to help the needy individuals who walked in the door seeking assistance. Giles and O'Keefe lied to engender compassion, but then edited their statements from the released videos."
For instance, one much-publicized recording had shown O'Keefe and Giles at the San Diego office. They show a worker purportedly seeking information from a contact in Mexico to help them smuggle underage girls from Mexico into the United States to work as prostitutes. The video did not show that the worker's 'contact' in Mexico was a police official. The employee collected as much specific information from Giles and O'Keefe as possible during their visit. The worker then contacted Mexican police to warn them of the plot. Brown said, "ACORN was not the criminal enterprise described by O'Keefe in his 'Chaos for Glory' statement – it did not receive billions in federal funds and did not control elections. ACORN is, however, disorganized and its operations were far from transparent, leaving it vulnerable to allegations of illegal activity and misuse of funds." Brown also noted that despite O'Keefe's appearing in the released videos as a "1970s Superfly pimp ... [i]n his actual taped sessions with ACORN workers, he was dressed in a shirt and tie, presented himself as a law student, and said he planned to use the prostitution proceeds to run for Congress. He never claimed he was a pimp."
Brown concluded, "Even if O'Keefe and Giles had truly intended to break the law, there is no evidence that any of the ACORN employees had the intent to aid and abet such criminal conduct or agreed to join in that illegal conduct." While faulting a few of the recorded ACORN members for "terrible judgment and highly inappropriate behavior", Brown said, "[T]hey didn't commit prosecutable crimes in California". Regarding the publicity related to the videos, Brown stated, "The evidence illustrates ... that things are not always as partisan zealots portray them through highly selective editing of reality. Sometimes a fuller truth is found on the cutting room floor."
" of purposefully ignoring the story, and said that it was favoring the political left. Andrew Breibart wrote in an article in The Washington Times that he had counseled Giles and O'Keefe to "... offer Fox News the full footage of each video before each was released". Breitbart said he developed a strategy to counter such presumed liberal media bias by courting the Fox News Corporation: "We had to devise a plan that would force the [other news] media to see the evidence before they had enough time to destroy these two idealistic 20-something truth seekers." Giles interviewed exclusively with Fox commentator Glenn Beck
on the day of the first video's release.
CNN
began coverage of the story as early as September 9. CBS
began to cover the story on September 11, the day after the story aired on Fox News. Breitbart and reporters of Fox News stayed on message, complaining that the "mainstream media" did not respond promptly or cover the story in sufficient depth. On September 11, 2009, Glenn Beck
was reported to have said, "FOX has had 133 reports on it, CNN, 90, MSNBC, 10. How's that possible? Hey, ABC, how's it working out for you with two?"
Breitbart and O'Keefe on September 11 announced that O'Keefe would not agree to be interviewed by CNN staff. They said that CNN favored ACORN in its coverage. But, CNN had reported on ACORN-related issues of alleged voter registration fraud (which were not substantiated). O'Keefe said he felt CNN's early coverage had been slanted in favor of ACORN, because CNN had interviewed both ACORN staff members and defenders.
FOX News said that, as late as September 15, the ABC anchor Charlie Gibson was unfamiliar with the story. It did not report that ABC's Jake Tapper
had been covering the issue since September 11. In a September 15 interview with Sean Hannity
of FOX News, Breitbart said that O'Keefe and Giles "... have been impugned in the media". Hannity said they had been "excoriated".
On September 17, 2009, Turner.com posted a list of all CNN transcripts covering the ACORN scandal, from the day the story was first released. The transcripts showed there was no evidence that Giles or O'Keefe had been "impugned" or "excoriated" by news commentators. The listed transcripts include extensive, objective coverage and discussion by CNN reporters Abbie Boudreau
, Wolf Blitzer
, Candy Crowley
, and others. Lou Dobbs
(then still at CNN) had offered an impassioned statement in support of Giles and O'Keefe on September 10, the day on which the videos were first aired.
The journalist Mark Bowden of The Atlantic said about the case in an interview September 18, 2009 with Alexandra Fenwick of the Columbia Journalism Review, "The young woman and filmmaker who visited those ACORN offices were political activists, and they put together what is, in essence, a very effective political protest against an organization they would like to damage. And they’ve done a very effective job of doing that. But I think they’re clearly not journalists."
The next spring, on March 20, 2010 Clark Hoyt
, the New York Times
public editor
, wrote an op-ed column conceding some errors in the paper's reporting. ACORN and its supporters had complained "that The Times got the story wrong and, by failing to correct it, has played into the hands of a campaign that has pushed the group near extinction." Hoyt acknowledged that it was by then known that it was not likely that O'Keefe went into the ACORN offices dressed as a pimp, as at the beginning and end of most of the videos. O'Keefe had presented himself "as a clean-cut young man, sometimes a college student, trying to rescue his girlfriend and under-age girls from an abusive pimp." But, Hoyt wrote, "ACORN's supporters appear to hope that the whole story will fall apart over the issue of what O’Keefe wore: if that was wrong, everything else must be wrong. The record does not support them. If O’Keefe did not dress as a pimp, he clearly presented himself as one: a fellow trying to set up a woman — sometimes along with under-age girls — in a house where they would work as prostitutes."
His article appeared before the release on April 1, 2010 of the California AG Report, which found that O'Keefe's videos had all been heavily edited to misrepresent the ACORN workers and present them in the worst possible light. The pair had set up the workers rather than doing investigative journalism. Investigations by the California AG, Brooklyn US Attorney and the US GAO found that ACORN workers had not participated in criminal activities.
described the video ensemble as a politically motivated piece that lacked context and did not present accurate information. She characterized the work as raw information instead of journalism. She said some elements of the ACORN videos seemed "shadows of journalism's muckraking past" and were commendable. The videos were criticized by MSNBC's Norah O'Donnell
, who suggested the use of hidden cameras was a form of entrapment.
Washington Post staff writers Darryl Fears and Carol Leonnig wrote that "Giles and O'Keefe have been criticized for accuracy problems. Their videos include the oft-repeated conservative claim that ACORN is expected to get up to $8.5 billion in government funds. But that's a bold exaggeration, as it includes $3 billion in stimulus funds set aside for revitalization efforts nationwide, and $5.5 billion in federal community development grants". The number assumed ACORN would apply for and win every project and grant in the country, and ACORN did not apply for any of the stimulus funds. Leonnig also observed that "the videos, in some cases, left out what I would call some exculpatory
material ... for example, in one, a employee at ACORN explains that there is no way ACORN would support what the couple were proposing, and she asks if they are putting her on, candid-camera style."
During a September 14 television appearance on FOX, O'Keefe appeared dressed in a fur coat, sunglasses, and holding a cane. The host announced "... [O'Keefe] is dressed exactly in the same outfit that he wore to these ACORN offices up and down the eastern seaboard." He asked, "[I]s that what you think a pimp looks like?" O'Keefe answered yes. By six weeks later, the political journalist Mike Stark noted that O'Keefe did not wear such clothing to the ACORN offices, where he wore subdued clothing and a tie, and in one instance posed as a candidate for Congress. Stark said, "If they really wanted the truth out there, why do they need to edit these tapes in the first place? Why aren't the unedited videos already in the public domain?"
The Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes cleared ACORN employees in the local office of criminal wrongdoing on March 1, 2010, after a five-month investigation. A law enforcement source said, "They edited the tape to meet their agenda", the Daily News quoted. The ACORN lawyer Arthur Schwartz commented that ACORN was "gratified that the DA has concluded something we knew all along." He said that O'Keefe and Giles had "used subterfuge to convince Congress and the media to vilify an organization that didn't deserve it."
Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now was a collection of community-based organizations in the United States that advocated for low- and moderate-income families by working on neighborhood safety, voter registration, health care, affordable housing, and other social issues...
(ACORN), where the ACORN workers appeared to advise the couple in how to hide prostitution activities and avoid taxes. The videos, which were recorded secretly by conservative activists Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe
James O'Keefe
James E. O'Keefe III is a conservative American activist who has produced controversial audio and video recordings of public figures and workers in a variety of organizations...
(the "young couple"), were released on Fox News and the website BigGovernment.com from September into November 2009. They quickly generated widespread, negative publicity for ACORN, a non-profit organization involved in voter registration, community organizing and acted as an advocate for low- and moderate-income people for nearly 40 years. The US Census Bureau and the IRS ended contracts with the organization, and the US Congress voted to suspend its funding to ACORN. Soon ACORN also lost most of its private funding, despite several independent investigations that by December 2009 began to reveal no criminal activity by ACORN staff existed. ACORN filed for Chapter 7
Chapter 7, Title 11, United States Code
Chapter 7 of the Title 11 of the United States Code governs the process of liquidation under the bankruptcy laws of the United States...
liquidation on November 2, 2010, effectively closing the organization,
In the videos, Giles posed as a prostitute
Prostitution
Prostitution is the act or practice of providing sexual services to another person in return for payment. The person who receives payment for sexual services is called a prostitute and the person who receives such services is known by a multitude of terms, including a "john". Prostitution is one of...
and O'Keefe posed as her boyfriend, apparently in "pimp" costume, (footage of him in costume was recorded separately, and OKeefe appeared at the ACORN offices in conservative street clothes). They visited ACORN offices in numerous cities, and created situations to secretly record. They later edited the videos to show low-level ACORN employees in eight cities appearing to provide advice to Giles and O'Keefe on how to avoid taxes and detection by the authorities with regard to their plans to engage in tax evasion
Tax evasion
Tax evasion is the general term for efforts by individuals, corporations, trusts and other entities to evade taxes by illegal means. Tax evasion usually entails taxpayers deliberately misrepresenting or concealing the true state of their affairs to the tax authorities to reduce their tax liability,...
, human smuggling and child prostitution. O'Keefe explained in September 2009 that he "targeted ACORN for the same reasons that the political right does: its massive voter registration drives."
An investigation was completed by the California Attorney General
California Attorney General
The California Attorney General is the State Attorney General of California. The officer's duty is to ensure that "the laws of the state are uniformly and adequately enforced" The Attorney General carries out the responsibilities of the office through the California Department of Justice.The...
in April 2010. In exchange for granting immunity to O'Keefe and Giles, the office acquired all the raw videos shot at three California ACORN offices. Its comparison of the raw videos with the released versions found that the published videos had been heavily edited
Fallacy of quoting out of context
The practice of quoting out of context, sometimes referred to as "contextomy" or "quote mining", is a logical fallacy and a type of false attribution in which a passage is removed from its surrounding matter in such a way as to distort its intended meaning....
to misrepresent the workers and the situations. In December 2009, March and June of 2010, independent investigations by the former Massachusetts Attorney General, the US Attorney of Brooklyn, and the US Government Accountability Office
Government Accountability Office
The Government Accountability Office is the audit, evaluation, and investigative arm of the United States Congress. It is located in the legislative branch of the United States government.-History:...
found no evidence that ACORN workers had misused government funds or participated in the criminal activities represented. But, ACORN was effectively destroyed by then.
On December 7, 2009, the former Massachusetts Attorney General
Massachusetts Attorney General
The Massachusetts Attorney General is an elected executive officer of the Massachusetts Government. The office of Attorney-General was abolished in 1843 and re-established in 1849. The current Attorney General is Martha Coakley....
, after an independent external investigation of ACORN, found the videos that had been released appeared to have been edited, "in some cases substantially". He found no evidence of criminal conduct by ACORN employees, but concluded that ACORN had poor management practices. On March 1, 2010, the District Attorney
District attorney
In many jurisdictions in the United States, a District Attorney is an elected or appointed government official who represents the government in the prosecution of criminal offenses. The district attorney is the highest officeholder in the jurisdiction's legal department and supervises a staff of...
's office for Brooklyn determined that the videos were "heavily edited" and concluded that there was no criminal wrongdoing by the ACORN staff in the videos from the Brooklyn ACORN office. On April, 1, 2010, an investigation by the California Attorney General
California Attorney General
The California Attorney General is the State Attorney General of California. The officer's duty is to ensure that "the laws of the state are uniformly and adequately enforced" The Attorney General carries out the responsibilities of the office through the California Department of Justice.The...
found the videos from Los Angeles, San Diego and San Bernardino also to be "heavily edited", and the investigation did not find evidence of criminal conduct on the part of ACORN employees. On June 14, 2010, the US Government Accountability Office
Government Accountability Office
The Government Accountability Office is the audit, evaluation, and investigative arm of the United States Congress. It is located in the legislative branch of the United States government.-History:...
(GAO) released its findings which showed that ACORN evidenced no sign that it, or any of its related organizations, mishandled any federal money they had received.
The Congressional resolutions to eliminate funding to ACORN were nullified by a federal court ruling that the measure was an unconstitutional bill of attainder
Bill of attainder
A bill of attainder is an act of a legislature declaring a person or group of persons guilty of some crime and punishing them without benefit of a judicial trial.-English law:...
. But, on August 13, 2010, a federal appeals court reversed that ruling and upheld the act that cut off federal funding for ACORN.
Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe
Hannah Giles (born March 15, 1989) is an American conservative activist who came to national attention with James O'Keefe in the United States in September 2009 when she was seen portraying a prostitute in videos which they had filmed secretly in encounters at offices of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform NowAssociation of Community Organizations for Reform Now
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now was a collection of community-based organizations in the United States that advocated for low- and moderate-income families by working on neighborhood safety, voter registration, health care, affordable housing, and other social issues...
(ACORN). At the time, Giles was an undergraduate studying journalism at Florida International University
Florida International University
Florida International University is an American public research university in metropolitan Miami, Florida, in the United States, with its main campus in University Park...
. Following the release of videos and extensive media coverage, she dropped out of college to "pursue demands to keep up with public appearances and job offers". Giles and O'Keefe first met when she called him to discuss her idea; together they spent $1,300 to accomplish what Washington Post reporters called a "Mission to Fell ACORN". Giles was lauded by conservative commentators for what they characterized as a series of investigative encounters at the prominent community organization.
James E. O'Keefe III (born June 28, 1984) is an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
activist-filmmaker who came to national attention in the United States in September 2009 with the release of his ACORN undercover videos. O'Keefe worked for about a year at the Leadership Institute
Leadership Institute
The Leadership Institute is a 501 non-profit organization located in Arlington, Virginia that teaches "political technology.".The Institute was founded in 1979 by conservative activist Morton C. Blackwell...
, led by Morton Blackwell
Morton Blackwell
Morton C. Blackwell is an American Republican Party activist. He is president and founder of the Leadership Institute , a 5013 non-profit educational foundation that teaches political technology....
. O'Keefe has described his politics as "progressive radical". He has expressed admiration for the philosophies of British writer G.K. Chesterton and Soviet dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was aRussian and Soviet novelist, dramatist, and historian. Through his often-suppressed writings, he helped to raise global awareness of the Gulag, the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system – particularly in The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of...
. He has made additional secret videos since then, also found to have been heavily edited to misrepresent his subjects, or present them in the worst light. On January 26, 2010, O'Keefe was arrested with three colleagues, including Robert Flanagan, the son of the acting US Attorney of the Eastern District of Louisiana, and initially charged with a federal felony for attempting to maliciously interfere with the office telephone system of US Senator Mary Landrieu
Mary Landrieu
Mary Loretta Landrieu is the senior United States Senator from the State of Louisiana and a member of the Democratic Party.Born in Arlington, Virginia, Landrieu was raised in New Orleans, Louisiana...
and to tape conversations of her and her staff. They later pled guilty to misdemeanor charges and were given minor sentences including community service.
Hidden camera recordings and video releases
In July and August 2009, Giles and O'Keefe visited ACORN offices in BaltimoreBaltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
, Washington D.C., Brooklyn, San Bernardino
San Bernardino
San Bernardino, California is a large city in the Inland Empire Metropolitan Area of Southern California.San Bernardino may also refer to:-Landforms:*San Bernardino , a torrent that flows through the Italian province of Verbano-Cusio-Ossola...
, San Diego, Philadelphia
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...
, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, and Miami. Giles dressed as a prostitute, while O'Keefe wore white khakis with a blue dress shirt and/or tie and claimed to be her boyfriend. Giles and O'Keefe recorded the encounters using hidden cameras and pretended to be seeking advice on how to run an illegal business which included the use of underage girls in the sex trade
Sex worker
A sex worker is a person who works in the sex industry. The term is usually used in reference to those in the sex industry that actually provide such sexual services, as opposed to management and staff of such industries...
.
September 2009
Edited videos from the visits to ACORN offices in BaltimoreBaltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
, Washington D.C., Brooklyn, San Bernardino
San Bernardino
San Bernardino, California is a large city in the Inland Empire Metropolitan Area of Southern California.San Bernardino may also refer to:-Landforms:*San Bernardino , a torrent that flows through the Italian province of Verbano-Cusio-Ossola...
, and San Diego were released between September 10 and September 17, 2009, and were used to launch Andrew Breitbart
Andrew Breitbart
Andrew Breitbart is an American publisher, commentator for the Washington Times, author, an occasional guest commentator on various news programs who has served as an editor for the Drudge Report website...
's BigGovernment.com website. Unedited transcripts were also released on the site.
In the videos, O'Keefe included segments in which he wore a fur coat, top hat, sunglasses, and wielded a cane, giving viewers, including the media, the impression that he had dressed that way when he visited the ACORN offices and spoke to its workers. As part of the deception and distortion of the released videos, O'Keefe added that portion as a lead-in, but he was dressed professionally during his ACORN visits. He never revealed himself on camera in the visits to the ACORN offices.
| ACORN Office Location | Video release date | Transcript release date | Date video taken | Number of videos / total time | Transcripts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Baltimore, Maryland | 2009-09-10 | 2009-09-10 | Unknown | 2 / 18:07 | 1 |
| Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution.... |
2009-09-11 | 2009-09-14 | 2009-07-25 | 2 / 12:46 | 1 |
| Brooklyn (New York) | 2009-09-14 | 2009-09-15 | 2009-08-04 | 2 / 15:42 | 1 |
| San Bernardino, California San Bernardino, California San Bernardino is a city located in the Riverside-San Bernardino metropolitan area , and serves as the county seat of San Bernardino County, California, United States... |
2009-09-15 | 2009-09-19 | 2009-08-17 | 4 / 28:31 | 1 |
| San Diego, California San Diego, California San Diego is the eighth-largest city in the United States and second-largest city in California. The city is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, immediately adjacent to the Mexican border. The birthplace of California, San Diego is known for its mild year-round... |
2009-09-17 | 2009-09-19 | 2009-08-18 | 2 / 12:48 | 1, 2 |
In the Baltimore office, the released video lets viewers hear O'Keefe saying that he and Giles were bringing up thirteen girls from El Salvador
El Salvador
El Salvador or simply Salvador is the smallest and the most densely populated country in Central America. The country's capital city and largest city is San Salvador; Santa Ana and San Miguel are also important cultural and commercial centers in the country and in all of Central America...
"like 15" years of age to live in their house and work as prostitutes "just to get them on their feet so they can do this type of thing". Giles remarks, "they are kind of dependent". Although the Baltimore ACORN staffer pointed out their plans were illegal, after O'Keefe says, "we are going to be putting a roof over [their] head," the ACORN employee states, "well then you know what you can always claim them as dependents". Later, the employee says, "you are gonna use three of them they are gonna be under 16 so you is eligible to get child tax credit and additional child tax credit". When O'Keefe asks, "what if they are going to be making money because they are performing tricks too?," the employee replies, "but if they making money and they are underage, then you shouldn't be letting anybody know anyway." The Baltimore employees were fired by ACORN after the video was released.
In the Washington D.C. office, Giles and O'Keefe ask about how to account for Giles' anticipated prostitution income on tax forms. Giles asks, "is there a way I can make up two years of tax returns?" The ACORN employee replies, "no you can't make it up", but tells Giles that she could form a business and state that she provides a service. The employee says, "you can have a business. She's not going to put down that she's doing prostitution", and "you don't have to sit back and tell people what it is you do". Giles later tells an ACORN employee that she will be giving the money earned from prostitution to O'Keefe. The employee says, "when the police ask you – you don't know where it's coming from".
In the Brooklyn office, Giles and O'Keefe tell a loan counselor they want to buy a house, and that an abusive pimp is "aggressively" pursuing Giles. She "wanted to leave because it is scary being subjected to a huge man who has control over your life". The ACORN counselor advises her "you get a tin if [he] is going to come beat you... you get a tin and bury it down in there and you put the money right in and you put grass over it and you don't tell a single soul". When discussing getting a house and Giles' earnings, O'Keefe says that Giles is very honest and an ACORN counselor replies, "honest is not going to get you the house that is why you probably been denied cause you probably going in saying". Another stated to Giles, "you can't say what you do for a living". For tax and banking purposes, and to establish a legitimate income and credit history, Giles was told she needed to start saying she was a "freelancer". The ACORN employee also suggested that Giles open two accounts at separate banks, depositing no more than $500 each a week to ensure few eyebrows are raised.
In the San Bernardino office, ACORN employee Tresa Kaelke told O'Keefe and Giles they could classify the underage brothel as a "group home" to avoid detection; she suggested the pair "invest in a line of vitamins" to disguise the location's true purpose. Later, Kaelke stated she believed the activists were joking and made a variety of absurd or joking statements to them. She said they were "somewhat entertaining, but they weren't even good actors". Office supervisor Christina Spach said Kaelke "pretended to cooperate with O'Keefe and Giles because she feared for her safety". Kaelke responded to the pair's requests for help setting up a child-prostitution ring on the video by claiming to be an ex-prostitute and exclaiming, "Heidi Fleiss
Heidi Fleiss
Heidi Lynne Fleiss is an American former madam, and also a columnist and television personality regularly featured in the 1990s in American media. She is often referred to as the "Hollywood Madam"....
is my hero!" The California Attorney General's investigation of Kaelke determined that "none of her claims" on the video was true, that "she was playing along with what she perceived as a joke", and there was "no evidence she had ever engaged in prostitution". According to CNN, the filmmakers released a transcript of their discussion with Kaelke that included a comment left out of the originally released tape in which Kaelke said that ACORN would have nothing to do with their prostitution business. Kaelke said that her supervisor "would shoot this down faster than a bat out of hell", but advised the couple to conceal the prostitution business by calling it a massage parlor. Kaelke was fired by ACORN after the videos were released.
In the San Diego office, edited video showed ACORN employee Juan Carlos Vera telling O'Keefe he had "contacts" in "Tijuana
Tijuana
Tijuana is the largest city on the Baja California Peninsula and center of the Tijuana metropolitan area, part of the international San Diego–Tijuana metropolitan area. An industrial and financial center of Mexico, Tijuana exerts a strong influence on economics, education, culture, art, and politics...
" to help get underage girls across the border. But, after the discussion with O'Keefe, Vera reported O'Keefe's fabricated plan for human smuggling to police. Vera was fired for what ACORN called "unacceptable conduct." Vera had said he tried to help the fake prostitute because she said that she needed to escape her controlling pimp. On July 8, 2010, after the AG's Report confirmed that he had contacted the police to try to thwart the couple's smuggling plan, Vera filed a civil suit in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California against O'Keefe and Giles for recording him without his permission, which was a violation of California law.
ACORN response
In response to release of the first videos, ACORN CEO Bertha LewisBertha Lewis (activist)
Bertha Lewis was the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Organizer of ACORN, which used to be a non-profit social justice organization with national headquarters in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C. United States until it disbanded in 2010....
said on Fox News on September 20, 2009, "[i]n a way, this was good for us, so what it did was show up to us what weaknesses we have, and we have moved swiftly... in order to correct that." She said that after viewing the tapes, she had fired all the employees featured and had begun a comprehensive external investigation. As ACORN learned more from its employees of what had taken place, it called the videos "false" and "defamatory." A spokesman accused O'Keefe of dubbing the audio on the videos. On September 23, 2009, ACORN filed suit in a Baltimore court against the filmmakers, citing "extreme emotional distress" of the ACORN workers and violation of two-party consent recording laws. It later withdrew the suit.
October 2009
On October 21, O'Keefe and Giles released video footage of their visit to the Philadelphia office of ACORN at a National Press ClubNational Press Club
The National Press Club is a professional organization and private social club for journalists. It is located in Washington, D.C. Its membership consists of journalists, former journalists, government information officers, and those considered to be regular news sources. It is well-known for its...
conference. They claimed it was to show they had received help there, after an ACORN spokesman had said that the pair had been asked to leave the Philadelphia office. The Washington Post "obtained a July 24 police report that showed police were called when O’Keefe and Giles attempted their sting at ACORN’s Philadelphia offices—and that the couple were escorted out of those offices." Susan Kinzie of The Washington Post noted that "the heavily edited footage includes audio of the two conservatives but none of the ACORN Housing Corp. worker's responses to their questions." Junette Marcano, a board member of Philadelphia ACORN, said, "This is a targeted assault to disenfranchise our members because . . . the right-wing agenda is to stop us from empowering people of low and moderate incomes. When you make the poor powerful, the powerful feel threatened."
Carol Leonnig, a Washington Post staff writer who attended the press conference, said in an interview that day on Fox News that, in explaining why the audio portion did not include the worker's responses, O'Keefe said, "on the one hand, the pair are concerned about the legal ramifications." O'Keefe claimed secondly "that the tape battery died." Commenting on the Philadelphia video, Leonnig said, "...when you go to this office, and you see this tape, I don't think he's got the goods to say that ACORN lied." Both Giles and O'Keefe declined to answer questions after the release of the October video.
| ACORN Office Location | Video release date | Transcript release date | Date video taken | Number of videos / total time | Transcript |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,... |
2009-10-21 | Not available | 2009-07-24 | 1 / Unknown | Not released |
November 2009
On November 16, 2009, the pair released a video from their visit to the Los Angeles office of ACORN.| ACORN Office Location | Video release date | Transcript release date | Date video taken | Number of videos / total time | Transcript |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, California Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California... |
Unknown | 2009-11-16 | Unknown | 2 / 15:28 | Not released |
Aftermath for ACORN
On March 19, 2010, The New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
reported that ACORN was on the verge of filing for bankruptcy; 15 of the group's 30 state chapters had disbanded over the past six months, and other chapters (including the largest, in New York and California) had renamed themselves and severed all ties to the national organization. Two unnamed ACORN officials told the Times that the following weekend, a teleconference was planned to discuss a bankruptcy filing; "private donations from foundations to Acorn [had] all but evaporated." The federal government had ended contracts with the group related to organizing counts in urban areas for the Census and work for the IRS. "[L]ong before the activist videos delivered what may become the final blow, the organization was dogged for years by financial problems and accusations of fraud." "That 20-minute video ruined 40 years of good work", said Sonja Merchant-Jones, former co-chairwoman of ACORN's recently closed Maryland chapter. "But if the organization had confronted its own internal problems, it might not have been taken down so easily."
On March 22, 2010, National ACORN spokesman Kevin Whelan says the organization's board decided to close remaining state affiliates and field offices by April 1 because of falling revenues. On April 20, the ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis
Bertha Lewis (activist)
Bertha Lewis was the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Organizer of ACORN, which used to be a non-profit social justice organization with national headquarters in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C. United States until it disbanded in 2010....
reported that ACORN was "still alive. We're limping along. We're on life support." Lewis said that ACORN's annual budget had been reduced from $25 million to $4 million, and that its staff of 350 to 600 people had been reduced to four. Lewis explained the controversy had left a stain on ACORN, "sort of like a scarlet letter." It had forced the group to spend money to respond to "one investigation after another".
Response by government and state authorities
PresidentPresident of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
stated the video content was "certainly inappropriate and deserves to be investigated". ACORN's partnership in the 2010 United States Census was terminated on September 11, 2009. The United States Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
voted to exclude ACORN from federal funding on September 14, and the House of Representatives voted 345-75 to eliminate federal funding to ACORN on September 17. John Boehner
John Boehner
John Andrew Boehner is the 61st and current Speaker of the United States House of Representatives. A member of the Republican Party, he is the U.S. Representative from , serving since 1991...
, the Republican leader of the House, introduced HR 3571 the "Defund ACORN Act" on September 15, and Rep. Darrell Issa
Darrell Issa
Darrell Edward Issa is the U.S. Representative for , and previously the 48th, serving since 2001. He is a member of the Republican Party. He was formerly a CEO of Directed Electronics, the Vista, California-based manufacturer of automobile security and convenience products...
moved to incorporate that bill as an amendment to the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009 (HR 3221). Both resolutions were later nullified in a federal court
United States district court
The United States district courts are the general trial courts of the United States federal court system. Both civil and criminal cases are filed in the district court, which is a court of law, equity, and admiralty. There is a United States bankruptcy court associated with each United States...
ruling by Judge Nina Gershon
Nina Gershon
Nina Gershon is a federal district judge in the Eastern District of New York. She was appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1996 at the recommendation of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan...
that the measures were an unconstitutional bill of attainder
Bill of attainder
A bill of attainder is an act of a legislature declaring a person or group of persons guilty of some crime and punishing them without benefit of a judicial trial.-English law:...
. On August 13, 2010, however, a federal appeals court reversed that decision, and upheld the Congressional resolutions that cut off federal funding for ACORN.
On September 23, the Internal Revenue Service
Internal Revenue Service
The Internal Revenue Service is the revenue service of the United States federal government. The agency is a bureau of the Department of the Treasury, and is under the immediate direction of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue...
removed ACORN from its volunteer tax-assistance program
IRS Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program
The Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program is an IRS program designed to help low and moderate-income taxpayers complete their annual tax returns at no cost. The program was originally founded 1971 by Gary Iskowitz at California State University Northridge...
. On September 24, the US Treasury Department's Inspector General announced it would initiate a broader probe into "the government's oversight of tax-exempt organizations like ACORN when they engage in political activities".
Independent external investigation by Proskauer Rose
On September 16, 2009, ACORN suspended advising new clients and initiated an independent review process, headed by Scott HarshbargerScott Harshbarger
Luther Scott Harshbarger is a lawyer and a Democratic politician from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.-Education and early career:...
, an attorney from the Proskauer Rose
Proskauer Rose
Proskauer Rose is one of the largest law firms in the United States, with twelve offices in the United States and around the world...
firm and a former Massachusetts Attorney General. On September 16, Bertha Lewis
Bertha Lewis (activist)
Bertha Lewis was the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Organizer of ACORN, which used to be a non-profit social justice organization with national headquarters in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C. United States until it disbanded in 2010....
, ACORN's CEO
Chief executive officer
A chief executive officer , managing director , Executive Director for non-profit organizations, or chief executive is the highest-ranking corporate officer or administrator in charge of total management of an organization...
, froze admission to all of ACORN's service programs and instituted a review committee to implement organizational reforms. The independent external investigation found that while some of the counsel given by employees and volunteers was "unprofessional and inappropriate", the videos that had been released appeared to have been edited, "in some cases substantially", and ACORN employees had taken no illegal actions.
Report by the Congressional Research Service
On December 22, 2009, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) released a report on ACORN activities, commissioned by the House Judiciary Committee. It stated that ACORN has not been found to violate any federal regulations in the past five years. In addition, findings included: There were no instances of voter fraud by individuals who were allegedly registered to vote improperly by ACORN or its employees; No instances where ACORN violated terms of federal funding in the last 5 years. The CRS found that O'Keefe and Giles may have violated Maryland and California laws banning the recording of face-to-face conversations without consent of both parties.Investigation by New York attorney general
The New York Attorney GeneralAttorney General
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general, or attorney-general, is the main legal advisor to the government, and in some jurisdictions he or she may also have executive responsibility for law enforcement or responsibility for public prosecutions.The term is used to refer to any person...
began an investigation on September 15, 2009 to ensure that state grants given to ACORN were properly spent. The New York City Council suspended all ACORN grants while the Brooklyn District Attorney
District attorney
In many jurisdictions in the United States, a District Attorney is an elected or appointed government official who represents the government in the prosecution of criminal offenses. The district attorney is the highest officeholder in the jurisdiction's legal department and supervises a staff of...
's Office conducted an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the videos. On March 1, 2010, the District Attorney
District attorney
In many jurisdictions in the United States, a District Attorney is an elected or appointed government official who represents the government in the prosecution of criminal offenses. The district attorney is the highest officeholder in the jurisdiction's legal department and supervises a staff of...
's office for Brooklyn determined that the videos were "heavily edited" and concluded that there was no criminal wrongdoing by the ACORN staff in the videos from the Brooklyn ACORN office.
Investigation by California attorney general
On September 25, 2009, in response to Governor Schwarzenegger's request to investigate the incidents, the California Attorney GeneralCalifornia Attorney General
The California Attorney General is the State Attorney General of California. The officer's duty is to ensure that "the laws of the state are uniformly and adequately enforced" The Attorney General carries out the responsibilities of the office through the California Department of Justice.The...
's office opened an investigation "into the controversy surrounding videos that purportedly show members of community organizing group ACORN giving advice on how to open a brothel."
On April 1, 2010, Attorney General Brown announced the office's findings, based on its review of the three full, unedited videotapes recorded in the California offices of ACORN. The AG had granted O'Keefe and Giles immunity from prosecution in exchange for the raw videotapes. Brown noted that the terms of the exchange did not exempt O'Keefe or Giles from being sued separately by the ACORN members filmed in the videos. Citing the 1967 Invasion of Privacy Act, Brown's report stated that "an application of these principles to the facts presented here strongly suggests that O'Keefe and Giles violated state privacy laws and provides fair warning to them and others that this type of activity can be prosecuted in California."
Brown criticized O'Keefe for acting to damage ACORN, rather than as a journalist trying to report a story from the facts. In his report, Brown said, "The video releases were heavily edited to feature only the worst or most inappropriate statements of the various ACORN employees and to omit some of the most salient statements by O'Keefe and Giles. Each of the ACORN employees recorded in California was a low level employee whose job was to help the needy individuals who walked in the door seeking assistance. Giles and O'Keefe lied to engender compassion, but then edited their statements from the released videos."
For instance, one much-publicized recording had shown O'Keefe and Giles at the San Diego office. They show a worker purportedly seeking information from a contact in Mexico to help them smuggle underage girls from Mexico into the United States to work as prostitutes. The video did not show that the worker's 'contact' in Mexico was a police official. The employee collected as much specific information from Giles and O'Keefe as possible during their visit. The worker then contacted Mexican police to warn them of the plot. Brown said, "ACORN was not the criminal enterprise described by O'Keefe in his 'Chaos for Glory' statement – it did not receive billions in federal funds and did not control elections. ACORN is, however, disorganized and its operations were far from transparent, leaving it vulnerable to allegations of illegal activity and misuse of funds." Brown also noted that despite O'Keefe's appearing in the released videos as a "1970s Superfly pimp ... [i]n his actual taped sessions with ACORN workers, he was dressed in a shirt and tie, presented himself as a law student, and said he planned to use the prostitution proceeds to run for Congress. He never claimed he was a pimp."
Brown concluded, "Even if O'Keefe and Giles had truly intended to break the law, there is no evidence that any of the ACORN employees had the intent to aid and abet such criminal conduct or agreed to join in that illegal conduct." While faulting a few of the recorded ACORN members for "terrible judgment and highly inappropriate behavior", Brown said, "[T]hey didn't commit prosecutable crimes in California". Regarding the publicity related to the videos, Brown stated, "The evidence illustrates ... that things are not always as partisan zealots portray them through highly selective editing of reality. Sometimes a fuller truth is found on the cutting room floor."
Investigation by the US Government Accountability Office
On June 14, 2010, the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its findings on ACORN, by then disbanded. It said that there was no evidence that the group, or any of its related organizations, mishandled any of the $40 million in federal money which they had received in recent years.Media controversy
The right-wing media complained about alleged media bias throughout the weeks as the ACORN video controversy developed. For instance, on September 15, Joshua Rhett Miller of Fox News accused the "mainstream mediaMainstream media
Mainstream media are those media disseminated via the largest distribution channels, which therefore represent what the majority of media consumers are likely to encounter...
" of purposefully ignoring the story, and said that it was favoring the political left. Andrew Breibart wrote in an article in The Washington Times that he had counseled Giles and O'Keefe to "... offer Fox News the full footage of each video before each was released". Breitbart said he developed a strategy to counter such presumed liberal media bias by courting the Fox News Corporation: "We had to devise a plan that would force the [other news] media to see the evidence before they had enough time to destroy these two idealistic 20-something truth seekers." Giles interviewed exclusively with Fox commentator Glenn Beck
Glenn Beck
Glenn Edward Lee Beck is an American conservative radio host, vlogger, author, entrepreneur, political commentator and former television host. He hosts the Glenn Beck Program, a nationally syndicated talk-radio show that airs throughout the United States on Premiere Radio Networks...
on the day of the first video's release.
CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
began coverage of the story as early as September 9. CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
began to cover the story on September 11, the day after the story aired on Fox News. Breitbart and reporters of Fox News stayed on message, complaining that the "mainstream media" did not respond promptly or cover the story in sufficient depth. On September 11, 2009, Glenn Beck
Glenn Beck
Glenn Edward Lee Beck is an American conservative radio host, vlogger, author, entrepreneur, political commentator and former television host. He hosts the Glenn Beck Program, a nationally syndicated talk-radio show that airs throughout the United States on Premiere Radio Networks...
was reported to have said, "FOX has had 133 reports on it, CNN, 90, MSNBC, 10. How's that possible? Hey, ABC, how's it working out for you with two?"
Breitbart and O'Keefe on September 11 announced that O'Keefe would not agree to be interviewed by CNN staff. They said that CNN favored ACORN in its coverage. But, CNN had reported on ACORN-related issues of alleged voter registration fraud (which were not substantiated). O'Keefe said he felt CNN's early coverage had been slanted in favor of ACORN, because CNN had interviewed both ACORN staff members and defenders.
FOX News said that, as late as September 15, the ABC anchor Charlie Gibson was unfamiliar with the story. It did not report that ABC's Jake Tapper
Jake Tapper
Jacob Paul "Jake" Tapper is an American print and television journalist, currently the senior White House correspondent for ABC News in Washington, D.C...
had been covering the issue since September 11. In a September 15 interview with Sean Hannity
Sean Hannity
Sean Hannity is an American radio and television host, author, and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show that airs throughout the United States on Premiere Radio Networks. Hannity also hosts a cable news show, Hannity,...
of FOX News, Breitbart said that O'Keefe and Giles "... have been impugned in the media". Hannity said they had been "excoriated".
On September 17, 2009, Turner.com posted a list of all CNN transcripts covering the ACORN scandal, from the day the story was first released. The transcripts showed there was no evidence that Giles or O'Keefe had been "impugned" or "excoriated" by news commentators. The listed transcripts include extensive, objective coverage and discussion by CNN reporters Abbie Boudreau
Abbie Boudreau
Abbie Boudreau is an ABC correspondent in Los Angeles. She joined on November 10, 2010. She was formerly with CNN. She has received seven regional Emmys for investigative reporting, writing and enterprise journalism.-Early career:...
, Wolf Blitzer
Wolf Blitzer
Wolf Isaac Blitzer is an American journalist who has been a CNN reporter since 1990. Blitzer is currently the host of the newscast The Situation Room and was the host of the Sunday talk show Late Edition until it was discontinued on January 11, 2009...
, Candy Crowley
Candy Crowley
Candy Alt Crowley is a CNN anchor and Chief Political Correspondent, specializing in U.S. presidential, gubernatorial, and Senate elections. She is based in CNN's Washington bureau, and hosted Inside Politics in place of Judy Woodruff before the show was replaced with The Situation Room. Crowley...
, and others. Lou Dobbs
Lou Dobbs
Louis Carl "Lou" Dobbs is an American journalist, radio host, television host on the Fox Business Network, and author. He anchored CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight until November 2009 when he announced on the air that he would leave the 24-hour cable news television network.He was born in Texas and lived...
(then still at CNN) had offered an impassioned statement in support of Giles and O'Keefe on September 10, the day on which the videos were first aired.
The journalist Mark Bowden of The Atlantic said about the case in an interview September 18, 2009 with Alexandra Fenwick of the Columbia Journalism Review, "The young woman and filmmaker who visited those ACORN offices were political activists, and they put together what is, in essence, a very effective political protest against an organization they would like to damage. And they’ve done a very effective job of doing that. But I think they’re clearly not journalists."
The next spring, on March 20, 2010 Clark Hoyt
Clark Hoyt
- Personal life and Professional career :Clark Hoyt is an American journalist who was the public editor of the New York Times, serving as the "readers' representative." He was the newspaper's third public editor, or ombudsman, after Daniel Okrent and Byron Calame...
, the New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
public editor
Ombudsman
An ombudsman is a person who acts as a trusted intermediary between an organization and some internal or external constituency while representing not only but mostly the broad scope of constituent interests...
, wrote an op-ed column conceding some errors in the paper's reporting. ACORN and its supporters had complained "that The Times got the story wrong and, by failing to correct it, has played into the hands of a campaign that has pushed the group near extinction." Hoyt acknowledged that it was by then known that it was not likely that O'Keefe went into the ACORN offices dressed as a pimp, as at the beginning and end of most of the videos. O'Keefe had presented himself "as a clean-cut young man, sometimes a college student, trying to rescue his girlfriend and under-age girls from an abusive pimp." But, Hoyt wrote, "ACORN's supporters appear to hope that the whole story will fall apart over the issue of what O’Keefe wore: if that was wrong, everything else must be wrong. The record does not support them. If O’Keefe did not dress as a pimp, he clearly presented himself as one: a fellow trying to set up a woman — sometimes along with under-age girls — in a house where they would work as prostitutes."
His article appeared before the release on April 1, 2010 of the California AG Report, which found that O'Keefe's videos had all been heavily edited to misrepresent the ACORN workers and present them in the worst possible light. The pair had set up the workers rather than doing investigative journalism. Investigations by the California AG, Brooklyn US Attorney and the US GAO found that ACORN workers had not participated in criminal activities.
Criticisms of the undercover videos
In September 2009, before the investigations revealed the selective and heavy editing of the videos, Alexandra Fenwick of the Columbia Journalism ReviewColumbia Journalism Review
The Columbia Journalism Review is an American magazine for professional journalists published bimonthly by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism since 1961....
described the video ensemble as a politically motivated piece that lacked context and did not present accurate information. She characterized the work as raw information instead of journalism. She said some elements of the ACORN videos seemed "shadows of journalism's muckraking past" and were commendable. The videos were criticized by MSNBC's Norah O'Donnell
Norah O'Donnell
Norah O'Donnell is an American print and television journalist, currently serving as the Chief White House Correspondent for CBS News in Washington, D.C., a position she has held since June 2011.-Early life:...
, who suggested the use of hidden cameras was a form of entrapment.
Washington Post staff writers Darryl Fears and Carol Leonnig wrote that "Giles and O'Keefe have been criticized for accuracy problems. Their videos include the oft-repeated conservative claim that ACORN is expected to get up to $8.5 billion in government funds. But that's a bold exaggeration, as it includes $3 billion in stimulus funds set aside for revitalization efforts nationwide, and $5.5 billion in federal community development grants". The number assumed ACORN would apply for and win every project and grant in the country, and ACORN did not apply for any of the stimulus funds. Leonnig also observed that "the videos, in some cases, left out what I would call some exculpatory
Exculpatory evidence
Exculpatory evidence is the evidence favorable to the defendant in a criminal trial, which clears or tends to clear the defendant of guilt. It is the opposite of inculpatory evidence, which tends to prove guilt....
material ... for example, in one, a employee at ACORN explains that there is no way ACORN would support what the couple were proposing, and she asks if they are putting her on, candid-camera style."
During a September 14 television appearance on FOX, O'Keefe appeared dressed in a fur coat, sunglasses, and holding a cane. The host announced "... [O'Keefe] is dressed exactly in the same outfit that he wore to these ACORN offices up and down the eastern seaboard." He asked, "[I]s that what you think a pimp looks like?" O'Keefe answered yes. By six weeks later, the political journalist Mike Stark noted that O'Keefe did not wear such clothing to the ACORN offices, where he wore subdued clothing and a tie, and in one instance posed as a candidate for Congress. Stark said, "If they really wanted the truth out there, why do they need to edit these tapes in the first place? Why aren't the unedited videos already in the public domain?"
The Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes cleared ACORN employees in the local office of criminal wrongdoing on March 1, 2010, after a five-month investigation. A law enforcement source said, "They edited the tape to meet their agenda", the Daily News quoted. The ACORN lawyer Arthur Schwartz commented that ACORN was "gratified that the DA has concluded something we knew all along." He said that O'Keefe and Giles had "used subterfuge to convince Congress and the media to vilify an organization that didn't deserve it."
External links
- An Independent Governance Assessment of ACORN; Proskauer Rose; December 7, 2009
- Congressional Research Service Report on ACORN, CRS; December 22, 2009
- "Video and Audio recordings of ACORN offices", raw and edited recordings provided by James O'Keefe to the California Attorney General's Office
- "Judge Instructs Fed Agencies to Resume ACORN Funding", Democracy Now! Website, 12 March 2010