ACORN Subpoenaed By America's Toughest Sheriff: Federal Funds Allegedly Used For Political Attacks

Phoenix, Arizona -- Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio issued subpoenas against the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) late Thursday in relation to a civil rights lawsuit that Arpaio believes ACORN helped instigate against him.

For months, Arpaio and ACORN have been at odds over immigration enforcement conducted by the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office (MCSO) under 287(g) agreements with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Earlier this year, ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis demanded that Arpaio step down. Then in June, she and Reverand Al Sharpton traveled to Phoenix to protest against Arapio.

Regarding that visit to Phoenix, Arpaio says, "With all the recent revelations about ACORN, it wouldn’t surprise me that they paid for Sharpton’s visit and are funding the protesters outside my office, and I’ll bet they are funding this frivolous lawsuit."

Arpaio believes that ACORN is partly responsible for a federal civil rights lawsuit (Melendres v. Arpaio) filed against him by Somos America and five individuals who allege that Arpaio targeted them because of their ethnicity. The lawsuit also alleges that the Maricopa County Sheriff's Department (MCSO) engages in a pattern of racial profiling when conducting "neighborhood crime suppression sweeps" in Hispanic neighborhoods.

"I believe the organization used state and federal funds meant to help poor people to conduct a campaign against me and my officers,"said Arpaio. "These records will show, I believe, that ACORN is in bed with the anti-immigration enforcement organizations which continue to demonstrate in front of my office trying to thwart my officers from enforcing state and federal law."

When I spoke with Sandschafer late Thursday, ACORN had not yet seen the subpoena even though MCSO said it had been served. We learned why later: The subpoena meant for the Arizona ACORN office has not been served yet, and the subpoena meant for ACORN's headquarters was served on an organization in Washington, DC whose office happens to be located in the same building as ACORN's local Washington, DC office. Indeed, the MCSO press release says the subpoena meant for ACORN's headquarters was served by Arpaio's co-counsel in Washington, DC. The organization who received the subpoena promptly gave it to the ACORN office, but ACORN's headquarters is not in Washington, DC. ACORN is headquartered in Louisiana.

After obtaining a copy of the subpoena, Sandschafer noted, "The subpoena does not seek any of the information Arpaio listed in his press release, which focused on funding."

According to Sandschafer, instead of requesting financial records, the subpoena requests "any and all correspondence" related to the Maricopa County Sheriff's Department and racial profiling that occurred between ACORN and third parties, including the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the office of Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon. The subpoena goes as far as naming specific employees of the ACLU.

"This is just another one of Arpaio's quasi-legal 'fishing expeditions'," says Sandschafer

Arpaio told local reporters Thursday evening, "I have a sneaking suspicion that ACORN is using federal taxpayer dollars to pursue their own agenda because they don't like me."

Sandschafer proudly confirmed, "Arizona ACORN has been a leader in the campaign to end the racial profiling, civil rights abuses and harassment and intimidation being perpetrated on our Latino communities every day at the hands of Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his deputies in Maricopa County.  In part, as a result of our work, Sheriff Arpaio is now under investigation by the US Justice Department."

Sandschafter said although her group is proud of their opposition to racial profiling policies, they are not affiliated with the civil rights lawsuit against Arpaio.

Arpaio says that after he reviews the records obtained from the subpoenas, he will make a decision regarding who, if anyone, at ACORN should be deposed.

These subpoenas come at the end of a difficult week for ACORN, when secretly filmed videos were released to the press showing ACORN employees advising a couple posing as a pimp and prostitute. Arpaio commented on the controversy, saying, "Apparently, ACORN’s scorn is not only for immigration laws. It seems to have little regard for several other areas of the law given what the video cameras have recorded in the last few weeks. I assume ACORN will have its hands full cleaning up this mess and less time to travel to Maricopa County."

ACORN was founded in 1970 to organize primarily in low-income areas, and the organization currently has nearly half a million members.

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Comments

[Dbos]

Teabagging acorns repugs seem to have nuts on their mind alot.

[Jack78]

It's better to let someone think you are an Idiot than to open your mouth and prove it.
Bravo, for proving my point, your pals at recess will be proud.

[escribacat]

Shouldn't this judge recuse himself from a case that involves himself?

[escribacat]

Sheriff, I mean.

[SEQUOIABISON]

Putting a sadistic psychopath in charge of a prison might make good sense to fellow Arizona republicans but his barbaric behavior is a blight on all Americans.

Many of the prisoners under his care are there for committing non-violent crimes like smoking a marijuana joint or some other drug related offense, while they may have violated the law, the law enforcers should not have the right to humiliate and mistreat people serving out their sentence. This is how you turn non-violent criminals into hateful violent ex-convicts.

We should be treating prisoners with the same respect we demand they show toward their fellow human beings, teach them a skill they can use when they get out of prison, so they can become productive citizens once they finish serving their debt to society, otherwise the recidivism rate goes up and society has lost an opportunity to rehabilitate a person who made a mistake.

[lylo]

Great post, and I really appreciate the use of the term "recidivism." Thank you for having a decent vocabulary.

[Jack78]

He has saved taxpayers millions. 'His volunteer posse of 3200 is the biggest in the nation and saves taxpayers the cost of paying deputies, costing nothing except for training posse members. The female inmates also paint curbs, remove graffiti, and pick up litter, saving taxpayers upwards of $500,000 over three years. His tents cost taxpayers $100,000, a fraction of the $70 million it would have cost to build another jail. Inmate meals cost 22 cents each, the cheapest in the nation, and are served only twice a day. Most other jails spend $4-5 dollars per day on inmate meals. Arpaio generates publicity because he implements innovative programs that save taxpayers money and deter criminal behavior. If he was a passive sheriff who simply coddled inmates and gave them their cable television and pornography, so there weren't any complaints, he wouldn't make news. His drug prevention and treatment program has been a success; a recidivism study found that only eight to ten percent of the 2000 men and women who graduated from it have returned, vastly better than the nation's 60-70 per cent recidivism rate. He started the only high school in the nation for inmates'. You were saying?

[Wardruna]

That’s awesome. That sheriff ought to have a cape at work!

[BambooHarvester]

BS

[aznurse]

AZ has the craziest political situations going on. The county attorneys sues the County supervisors,
the sheriff sues them both. the gop held representatives can't stand the gop governor and are at constant odds with each other.
the dems are totally left out..
It's a good f-ing thing the weather is nice.

[idisVA]

21st century McCarthism

[sparkandy]

McCarthyism, perhaps? At least spell the word right.

[BlueMed]

Arpaio is of Italian heritage. As a "full blood" Italian, I am disgusted to share even a drop of common ethnicity with this individual.
He should remember what happened to his ancestors when they arrived to America. Ellis Island was a veritable concentration camp. Italians were sometimes lynched in the South, just like blacks. The 1924 immigration act especially restricted the influx of more Italians and Jews. Italian-Americans were interned in camps during the war like the Japanese-Americans. And so on.
But today Italian-Americans feel they have "arrived": most of them live in (all white) suburbs, and they are as racist as the other "whites", even though for the longest time they weren't even considered "white".
When I was living in Philadelphia, an Italian immigrant asked me why I wanted to live in a 'hood surrounded by "all those...you know...all those blacks". I felt so sad for him, for his lack of any sense of the history of his (our) people's struggles.

[bowthai]

Yes, too many of us forget that our European ancestors were scorned. Even in the case of illegal immigration, while I support securing our borders in order to stem this problem, our nation's history is full of illegal immigration. It's just that those people would come via boat across the Atlantic. I think keeping this historical perspective would help us better work out solutions to this debate.

[graffitijoe]

ACORN should go ahead and disband, then come back in another form later. If not they will be held up in court and by investigations until they are slowly and painfully driven out of business anyway.

[ephoenix5]

Even if Acorn was funding the suit -- which they claim they are not and probably are not -- how does that take away from the fact that Arpaio (it is widely known) blantantly discriminates against Hispanics. He conducts his so called "crime suppression sweeps" in predominantely Hispanics areas. His goons are known for stopping anyone just for looking brown (even if no traffic infraction has been committed) there are hundreds of people who have been stopped simply because they were driving in the area where Arpaio was conducting his "brown" sweeps. Arpaio is known to have his goons stop pedestrians to ask for papers -- these powers are not given to him by his 287(g) agreement -- he just takes it upon himself to harass and presume anyone with "brown" skin guilty of being here illegally even if they have been here for generations -- it doesn't matter to him -- because Arpaio has actually said that he knows what illegals look like -- I bet his does ... and it starts with B (row) and ends with an N -- according to Arpaio.

[hamchunk]

You forgot to add how many illegals with felony warrants he picked and those wanted on state charges. Quite a few, if I remember correctly from the Phoenix press. So I guess his methods work.

[DialectDerelict]

it was less than 10%, hamchunk. that thar's some fine methods!

[StillweRise]

"I have a sneaking suspicion that ACORN is using federal taxpayer dollars to pursue their own agenda because they don't like me."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Brillian police work, there, Sherriff Joe. (lol)...

As a Phx resident formerly from Chicago (and cook county).... I HAVE "NEVER" SEEN A BIGGER PUBLICITY HOUND !!! I mean this guy NEVER misses an opportunity to create a headline, exploit a topic, or jump in front of a camera.

THIS ought to be 'gooood' ! pass the popcorn!

[Jack78]

I lived in Phoenix for years and I was born and raised on the South Side of Chicago.

If you think that Daley & Blago aren't bigger publicity hounds, you're eating too many sliders.

[doctorwang]

From a local (Phoenix) article concerning Arpaio and this nonsense:

"Maricopa County Sheriff's Office press releases are known for being as dependable as dispatches from the Flat Earth Society. But this latest one informing the public about Sheriff Joe Arpaio's lickspittle attorney Timothy Casey's latest legal maneuver jumps the proverbial shark.

Casey, known for killing whole forests to produce the reams of paper he buries his enemies in, has reportedly made the brilliant move of subpoenaing an organization -- ACORN -- that has absolutely nothing to do with the lawsuit at hand."

I recommend reading the entire article. Arpaio is a publicity hound who uses the power of his office in order to gain national attention. Acorn has nothing to do with his current problems- he's just jumping on the F0X bandwagon.

http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/bastard/2009/09/joe_arpaio_subpoenas_acorn_rec.php

[NoSillyName]

Arpaio Joe is out of control. Now he has "subpoena power"?! He suffers from some sort of autocratic delusion.

[BlackJAC]

In all seriousness, most legal documents are served by county sheriff's representatives.

[rf dude]

In all seriousness, subpoenas are issued by a judge and not a sheriff...
--

[jordan327]

No........­..........­acorn is out of control.

[doctorwang]

I just donated $100 to ACORN in your name. BTW: you're welcome.

[StillweRise]

you didn't even know who they were until the right decided to demonize them for a distant and tenuous relationship to then Senator Obama during the campaign.

[BlackJAC]

I propose that we all mail the guy an acorn apiece.

[den1953]

Some how i have a felling this story will take a turn and the stinger will get stung!

[Phxflyer]

Joe Arpaio -- America's dumbest and most corrupt sheriff.

[ThinkCreeps]

* Large jurisdiction category.

I'm sure there's still plenty of room at the bottom

[Phxflyer]

You would hope, but in Joe's case he is the bottom.