As recently as December 2012, Public Policy Polling found that nearly half of Republican voters believes ACORN boosted President Obama’s re-election prospects. While people are certainly entitled to believe whatever they wish, let’s not forget that ACORN doesn’t actually exist — the defunct group permanently closed its doors in 2010.
As it turns out, GOP voters aren’t the only ones with lingering concerns about an organization that only exists in the imaginations of conservatives.
A new short-term budget bill introduced on Monday by House Republicans includes a bizarre provision banning federal funding to anti-poverty group ACORN, despite the fact that the group has already been stripped of federal funding — and has been defunct for nearly three years.
ACORN leaders announced that the group was disbanding in March 2010, after Congress cut off all federal funding to the organization. The provision in the current GOP budget bill, buried on page 221 of 269, would duplicate legislation that has already passed, to target an organization that does not exist.
A spokesperson for the House Appropriations Committee told the Huffington Post the provision in the bill is “typical.” I’ll concede that I’m not familiar enough with the minutiae of House continuing resolutions to say whether this is accurate or not.
But I can say with confidence that if it’s “typical” for House Republicans to write up spending bills barring funds for non-existent entities, this isn’t a positive development. Has the House Appropriations Committee also included provisions to prevent funding of Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster? Because at this point, they’re about as real as ACORN.
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