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Local ACORN cleans up act after '06 scandal I Seattle Time... Page 1 of 3
Wednesday, October 29,2008 - Page updated at 12:00 AM
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Local ACORN cleans up act
after '06 scandal
By Sara Jean Green
Seattle Times staff reporter
After King County Elections officials uncovered what would
later be described as the most egregious instance of voterregistration
fraud in state history, John Jones was
summoned to the office of then-King County Prosecutor
Norm Maleng.
It was early last year and Maleng's office was preparing to
file charges against six canvassers who had filled out
nearly 1,800 voter-registration cards the previous fall with
names they made up using phone directories and books of
baby names. Jones' organization, the state chapter of the
Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now
- commonly known as ACORN - had paid the workers
$8 an hour to sign up low-income voters in King and
Pierce counties.
Maleng, King County's Republican prosecutor who died in
May 2007, pulled Jones aside for a man-to-man talk.
Maleng told Jones that as a community leader, it wasn't
enough for him to admit fault and take responsibility for it:
Jones must make sure the mistakes made in fall 2006
never, ever happen again.
SEA
John Jones, the Washington ACORN president, said he
welcomes scrutiny of the organization's voter registrations.
Last week - as Republican presidential candidate John McCain continued to question the validity of the 1.3
million new voters ACORN has registered nationally for the November election - Jones said Maleng's words.
are forever burned into his memory.
Maleng "said he respected the good work ACORN does but he made it clear that if there were any more
problems [with voter registrations], we'd be having a very different conversation," Jones said.
Since signing a settlement agreement with King County in summer 2007, the local ACORN chapter has
remained under a microscope. For now, it has eliminated its mass voter-registration drives, registering only
500 voters this year compared with the 37,000 it registered for the last presidential election in 2004.
Still, Jones said - and state and county officials confirmed - that Washington ACORN hasn't made a single
mistake in adding its newest voters to county rolls.
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