Too good to be true

What sounds too good to be true, probably is.
In most cases, we embrace groups that are helping register voters. Minnesota’s extensive voter outreach efforts conducted by the Office of the Secretary of State has resulted in an all-time high number of new registrations. That’s good news.
What’s not good news is that at least four states are investigating alleged voter-registration fraud by the Association of Community Organizations Reform Now, known as ACORN. In some cases, advocates for the group allegedly offered cigarettes to some and badgered others to sign multiple voter registration cards.
ACORN is spending $16 million this year to register new Democrats and is boasting it has put 1.3 million new voters on the rolls, according to the Wall Street Journal, which rightly wonders how many of these new registrations are real.
Already, officials in Ohio are investigating voter fraud connected with the group; Florida’s Seminole County is withholding ACORN registrations that appear fraudulent; New Mexico, North Carolina and Missouri are looking into hundreds of ACORN registrations; Wisconsin is investigating ACORN employees who may have made people up or registered people that were still in prison. And there’s more.
But ACORN’s problems with voter registration are not new. In 2004 and 2006, ACORN employees were indicted in Ohio and later in Missouri for submitting false registration; in Washington workers were found guilty for filling out registration forms with names from a phone book.
Groups that encourage people to register to vote are usually doing a good deed. But in this case, the group has a larger agenda, which includes electing people that will keep it on the dole. According to the Wall Street Journal, American taxpayers have provided millions to the group, under the guise of seeking a living wage, affordable housing and tax justice.
The U.S. Justice Department must investigate with its eyes wide open to see the larger picture — that this is not a local issue, but an organized effort to stack the deck and continue to feed from the federal trough.