A pretend prostitute and her pretend pimp have rattled ACORN, an anti-poverty group that has grown to become a political target of the GOP. Now it stands to lose federal funding.
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, has a lot of explaining to do.
It blames Fox News shows for hammering the organization over questionable voter-registration practices this decade. And now a couple of 20-somethings, including Florida International University student Hannah Giles, set up a "sting" shown on YouTube where ACORN workers in several cities — from Baltimore to San Bernardino, Calif. — offered tax advice to run a "prostitution" business.
ACORN has been sloppy, and its poor management has hurt the very people it set out to help: the disenfranchised. Its management now promises mandatory employee training. That's too little, too late.
To its credit, Miami's ACORN office turned in 11 former voter-registration canvassers who are accused of faking names on nearly 200 voter forms. Florida Secretary of State Kurt Browning says there is no evidence of any "widespread attempts" at voter fraud.
To read the complete editorial, visit The Miami Herald.