The Register-Herald, Beckley, West Virginia

Local News

September 23, 2009

ACORN: Rahall defends his vote against funding shutoff

Without due process, Supreme Court holds, Congress can’t ‘punish’

By Mannix Porterfield

Concern that the Constitution could be put in jeopardy led him to vote in the minority last week in a move to shut off funding for the controversy-ridden activist group ACORN, Rep. Nick Rahall says.

ACORN, an acronym for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, has come under intense fire of late after some of its employees were seen on a video dispensing advice to a couple posing as a prostitute and pimp.

Once that episode became public knowledge, Congress last week voted to cut off its federal funding.

On the video, shot by the couple in Brooklyn, ACORN employees are depicted as telling the pair to provide false information about the source of their income or to launder money to land housing assistance. For days, the video was been viewed across the nation via Internet.

Asked why he voted with 75 members of Congress in a losing bid to block the funding shutoff to ACORN, Rahall said he was concerned about possibly violating the constitutional ban against bills of attainder.

“The Supreme Court has held that our Constitution prohibits all legislative acts, ‘no matter what their form, that apply either to named individuals or to easily ascertainable members of a group, in such a way as to inflict punishment on them without a judicial trial ...’” the 3rd District congressman said.

“ACORN may be guilty of certain infractions and, if so, they should be investigated and punished through the appropriate administrative and judicial process, but Congress should not punish individuals or organizations without due process,” he said.

“It’s like throwing the baby out with the bath water.”

A potential rival for the seat he has held since 1977 rebuked Rahall for voting with the minority.

“This vote by Nick is an insult and embarrassment to every man, women and child living in the 3rd District,” said Marty Gearheart, a Republican businessman who ran against the Democratic incumbent in 2008.

Gearheart has announced his intentions to oppose Rahall in the 2010 election but hasn’t actually filed candidacy papers. The only Republican formally in the race is Lee Bias.

Gearheart had challenged Rahall last weekend to explain why he would “cast a vote in favor of an organization with this kind of record.”

— E-mail: mannix@register-herald.com

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