[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 139 (Wednesday, September 30, 2009)]
[House]
[Page H10129]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            DEFUNDING ACORN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Franks) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Mr. Speaker, recently this body moved to cut 
off all funding, all Federal funding, from the Association of Community 
Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN.
  By now we have all seen reports of several recent videos revealing 
ACORN employees coaching two young individuals on how to obtain 
government-subsidized housing to set up an underground prostitution 
house with underage girls brought into this country illegally.
  But this is only the beginning of ACORN's criminal activities, Mr. 
Speaker. ACORN is under investigation in at least 14 States for voter 
registration fraud. And ACORN workers have consistently employed 
criminal tactics, including establishing an illegal quota system and 
illegally compensating canvassers. ACORN has repeatedly reported false 
information to the IRS and to the Department of Labor. And to cap it 
off, Mr. Speaker, ACORN and its affiliates have received more than $53 
million in Federal funds from 1994 to 2008 and were eligible for up to 
$8.5 billion more from the economic stimulus bill and the 2010 Federal 
budget.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe one of the most overlooked and astounding 
trophies in ACORN's criminal hall of fame is its role in fighting for 
policies that led to the mortgage crisis and ultimately catalyzed our 
current economic recession. ACORN fought vigorously for regulatory 
reform of the Community Reinvestment Act, a 1977 bill that drastically 
weakened mortgage lending standards. The result of the new regulations 
ACORN lobbied for was that banks were no longer rated because they made 
good loans or their standard of equitable lending, but rather, they 
were rated based on the number of loans they made, regardless of the 
ability of the borrower to pay back the loan or to qualify for a loan 
in the first place.
  Banks were hit with large fines if they refused to dole out these 
toxic loans, the majority of which they knew would not be repaid. And 
if they still dared resist the government's mandate, ACORN would 
publicly picket them or threaten to hit these banks with lawsuits to 
force them to comply.
  Mr. Speaker, although the mainstream media has been largely silent on 
the ties between ACORN and President Obama, it was actually during this 
time in the early part of President Obama's career when he was working 
with ACORN that President Obama was part of the lawsuit to force 
Citibank to abandon its time-tested lending standards and disperse 
millions and millions of dollars in high-risk loans. Now this isn't 
speculation, Mr. Speaker. His name is listed on the records of the 
lawsuit. President Obama played a significant role in helping to shape 
the mortgage debacle that caused America's recent and ongoing economic 
crisis.
  The result of the lawsuits like the one filed by Mr. Obama and ACORN 
has been that millions of dollars in toxic loans were made as a result 
of ACORN and its subsidiaries using the CRA regulations to bludgeon 
America's financial institutions into making loans they never should 
have and otherwise never would have made. As we all know now, those 
toxic loans were packaged and resold on Wall Street, and the entire 
system began to crumble.
  If those original loans, Mr. Speaker, that were sold to Wall Street 
had been made under the traditional, financially sound practices based 
on income, down payments and credit histories, rather than the 
politically correct and financially fatal criteria that Barack Obama 
sued to achieve, the entire financial meltdown might have been avoided.
  But how many Americans know that, Mr. Speaker? How many Americans are 
aware of the role that ACORN and one of their lawyers and close allies 
by the name of Barack Obama played in creating the housing and 
financial crisis?
  Mr. Speaker, the ironic reality now is that President Barack Obama is 
put in the schizophrenic position of signing a bill to defund the very 
organization that helped to launch his career and ultimately helped get 
him elected. And the silence from the Obama administration on the ACORN 
issue has been unbelievable, Mr. Speaker.
  The Obama administration and liberal Democrats in Congress now have a 
choice. They can take a sincere stand against corruption by launching 
investigations into ACORN and work with Republicans to pass the Defund 
ACORN Act to stop all Federal funding for ACORN, or they can throw 
their supposed commitment to transparency and accountability out the 
window for good.
  Mr. Speaker, let us hope that they will choose to stand against 
allowing ACORN or any other corrupt organization to receive one more 
dime of taxpayer dollars now or ever again.

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