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ACORN’s Lewis Blisters Michael Steele: “It’s Not Nice To Tell Lies”

Bertha Lewis, the African American head of the voting rights group ACORN, has twice tried to contact one of ACORN’s most relentless critics, Michael Steele, to clear the air.

Just after Steele’s election as RNC chair, Lewis tells us, she called and emailed him to congratulate him and to say his election was good for the GOP. Needless to say, Steele didn’t respond.

So Lewis is doing the next best thing. In an interview with our reporter Beth Marlowe, she told us what she’d say to Steele if he’d return her calls.

“It’s not nice to tell lies,” Lewis said she would tell Steele. “It’s not nice to distort the facts.”

Steele has relentlessly criticized ACORN, a GOP “vote fraud” bogeyman during the 2008 election, calling it a “criminal organization.” TPM reports that Steele is now raising money off ACORN, accusing the group in a fundraising letter of plotting to rig the census to solidify Dem control.

Lewis pushed back hard on Steele’s attacks. “Don’t keep continuing these bogus allegations of “voter fraud,’ because it’s not true,” she said. “It never has been true, you have no proof.”

Lewis offered Steele some advice on how to do a better job as head of the RNC: “I think if you’re gonna do this and chart a new course for the Republican party I guess I would say, `Michael, you know, really. You guys really need to be a little bit cleaner about what you do.’”

Audio of Lewis soon.

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Posted by Greg Sargent | 04/09/2009, 12:35 PM EST | Categories: Republican National Committee

13 Responses

  1. Trevor J | April 9th, 2009 at 12:50 pm

    Brilliant. This cracks me up. There’s not nearly enough use of the “L” word in politics.

    If I were Newsweek’s little CW monitor, this response and Adam Serwer’s report for TAPPED that ACORN didn’t know what a tea party even was, the little arrow would be pointing up. Or, to put in VH1 terms, ACORN is having the best week ever.

  2. Tena | April 9th, 2009 at 01:28 pm

    Hee hee!

    To hear Rush tell it, ACORN is like The Illluminati, only darker. Ahem.

    But they are at the head of the Grand Obama Conspiracy to turn the US in to France. (if only they could!)

  3. Debra | April 9th, 2009 at 01:34 pm

    Steele’s assertion that the red states are growing more rapidly is true, greatly due to an increase in the hispanic population which is not a voting block for the Republicans. And does Steele have the idea that the Obama/McCain election was close enough to be changed by a few electoral votes? That’s like a football team getting completely spanked by another team and then saying if the goal post had been moved a quarter of an inch it might have made a difference in the outcome. Sounds like whining to me.

  4. Tena | April 9th, 2009 at 01:50 pm

    “Steele’s assertion that the red states are growing more rapidly is true,”

    Well don’t look now, but a lot of those “red” states are growing alright – growing bluer.

    The only Red States left are those that run in an arc from Oklahoma over to Western Penna – the Ozarks, the Blue Ridge and the Deep South.

  5. MsJoanne | April 9th, 2009 at 02:10 pm

    I wish the GOP would stop thinking this is a football game which needs strategy and would look at us as a country which needs running. I don’t care about party politics, I care about what is happening here. If you don’t want to help govern, step aside and let the people who take their jobs seriously take over.

    Enough!

  6. Tena | April 9th, 2009 at 02:29 pm

    MsJoanne – I feel ya.

    It’s rather discouraging overall to know that there are all those people in public office who really do not care about the country. IT’s way down the list, after Christian, Conservative, Republican, then and only then – American.

  7. RedMolly23 | April 9th, 2009 at 02:49 pm

    But if they stopped thinking of it as a football game, they might be forced to confront the fact that they are entirely devoid of ideas. Reflexive opposition is all they have to offer.

  8. Polaris | April 9th, 2009 at 03:02 pm

    Litigate his ***. Sue him and the RNC for defamation.

  9. Ethan | April 9th, 2009 at 04:42 pm

    This from the party of Tom DeLay. HA!

  10. Tatianna | April 9th, 2009 at 09:26 pm

    A question: So what your saying here bloggers is that you are willing to turn our wonderful Country into a third world Country to secure votes for Democrats? I’m just saying that’s crazy! We had no problem getting Obama elected, why the fear? If we contiue allowing illegal immigration we will be in big environmental and financial trouble more than now.

  11. Tatianna | April 9th, 2009 at 09:29 pm

    I re-read the post I think I was off the mark and you were not saying we need more illegal immigration. MY BAD Sorry

  12. R. George Dunn | April 9th, 2009 at 10:31 pm

    The fear of ACORN being a major player in the Census is widespread. Why? Is it voter fraud? Not really. It is that fact that the ACORN volunteers are nearly all in campaign support of the Democrat Party and for the Government to fund this organization or accept it as objective enough to trust has everyone on the right up in arms.

    Mr. Steele is struggling with his values or shall one say his perceived values. His proper response to Bertha Lewis should have been one of open meeting and debate. The new civilian Army of President Obama is recruiting who for it’s active full time members and what will be their responsibility? All this needs to be openly discussed and the light of truth brought on it, to clear the air one way or the other.

  13. Blue | April 10th, 2009 at 10:41 pm

    There is plenty on ACORN including court case that at the very least implicate them. Even if they are Boy and Girl Scouts, why should they be blindly trusted with the Census. Be warned, my property is posted No Trespassing and I will only work with government workers regarding the Census. All others will get a “Free Ride” downtown in the back of my police car.

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