ACORN Madness!

Unless you've been off the grid for the last two weeks (if you have I commend you and I'm envious), you've probably heard something about the ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) 'scandal.' GOP lawmakers and conservative talkingheads are lathered up good over an undercover video that was posted to the internet two weeks ago in which ACORN employees appear to be offering tax advice to a prostitute and her pimp. Predictable blustering and harumphing ensued, followed by mock outrage at the way taxpayer dollars were being spent.

Apparently, ACORN was set to recieve a smidge of the TARP funds (To put 'smidge' into context, Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida had this to say: "The amount of money that ACORN has received in the past 20 years altogether is roughly equal to what the taxpayer paid to Halliburton each day during the war in Iraq.") In order to strike a blow to the forces of evil (you know, those forces responsible for registering poor and underserved voters, gasp!) the House quickly drew up legislation to deprive ACORN of ever receiving federal funding. They even gave it a nifty name (just in case you didn't know the purpose of the legislation), the Defund ACORN Act.

For those who might be out of the loop when it comes to GOP bogeymen (including me, prior to pokin around the intarweb), the GOP and its cohorts have been after ACORN for a while now, alleging, among other things, voter fraud. Normally I would chalk all of this up to politics as usual, in the same camp with the unsavory practice of naming legislation after abducted, raped or murdered children. However, the poorly drafted legislation could have unintended, and hilarious, consequences.

If the legislation is enacted and applied as written, it would prohibit "covered organizations" from ever receiving government money, whether in the form of contracts, grants or any other type of disbursement. So far, so good. It's not until the legislation defines "covered organizations" that it runs into trouble:

(b) Covered Organization- In this section, the term ‘covered organization’ means any of the following:


2(1) Any organization that has been indicted for a violation under any Federal or State law governing the financing of a campaign for election for public office or any law governing the administration of an election for public office, including a law relating to voter registration.

(2) Any organization that had its State corporate charter terminated due to its failure to comply with Federal or State lobbying disclosure requirements.


(3) Any organization that has filed a fraudulent form with any Federal or State regulatory agency.


(4) Any organization that--


(A) employs any applicable individual, in a permanent or temporary capacity;


(B) has under contract or retains any applicable individual;

(C) has any applicable individual acting on the organization’s behalf or with the express or apparent authority of the organization.

Unfortunately for the reactionary lawmakers responsible for this farce, most of the U.S. defense industry falls under this definition of "covered organization." As Ryan Grim of the Huffington Post puts it, "the bill could plausibly defund the entire military-industrial complex. Whoops."

This point has not been lost on Rep. Alan Grayson. Mr. Grayson is asking the public to help compile a list of "covered organizations" in order to have it added to the legislative history of this bill. See here for a radio interview with Representative Grayson.

The other issue confronting proponents of this bill is the Constitutional prohibition against bills of attainder. For a look at the relevant precedent dealing with bills of attainder, see here.