Former ACORN staffer testifies
A former staffer for an affiliate of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now testified today that the organization was provided a “donor list” from the presidential campaign of Barack Obama in late 2007 for fundraising efforts.
Anita Moncrief, a former Washington, D.C. staffer for Project Vote, which she described as a sister organization of ACORN, said her supervisor told her the list of campaign contributors came from the Obama campaign. Moncrief said she has a copy of a “development plan” that outlines how Obama contributors who had “maxed out” under federal contribution limits would be targeted to give to Project Vote, and that it was her job to identify such contributors.
Project Vote national spokesman Michael McDunnah denied that the list came from Obama’s campaign, according to The Associated Press. Donor lists for candidates are public information and can be downloaded from the Federal Election Commission’s Web site. The lists include how much individuals have given. ACORN officials have said Moncrief was fired from Project Vote and that she is not a credible witness. Moncrief testified that ACORN and Project Vote were virtually identical.
The Obama campaign said it wasn’t involved in ACORN registration drives .
“Our campaign has not coordinated with ACORN whatsoever on any voter registration activities,” said Obama spokesman Sean Smith.
A Republican lawyer submitted a computer disk of the Obama database to Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson.
Moncrief, whom Project Vote fired earlier this year, testified for more than two hours during a hearing on a Pennsylvania Republican Party lawsuit aimed at curbing voter fraud in Tuesday’s general election.
An Obama campaign spokeswoman last week had said the campaign has “no ties” to ACORN.
Moncrief, 29, who now lives in Virginia, also said that she had taken a call from an Obama campaign worker inquiring whether it was the same organization Obama had worked with in the 1990’s.
Moncrief said she had received repeated warnings to “ba