ACORN drawing even more criticism

LAS VEGAS, Oct. 8 (UPI) -- A community-based organization's voter drive that has registered some 1.3 million voters is drawing allegations of fraud, observers say.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, known as ACORN, aims to register to vote lower income blacks and Latinos, ABC News reported Wednesday.

The group, based in Las Vegas, has been accused by Nevada officials of using fake and duplicate names, including the names of Dallas Cowboy players, in a fraudulent voter registration.

Investigators have alleged that ACORN hired 59 inmates on work release as canvassers. One inmate who had worked as a "team leader" told investigators that "some of the canvassers hired by ACORN were

"lazy crackheads."

Since June, local election officials in at least nine other states have reported problems with thousands of registrations submitted by ACORN.

Sally LaSota, the director of the Lake County elections board in Indiana, said information on some of the registration cards submitted to her office appeared to have been copied from the telephone book.

"We don't know if any of these people are legitimate," LaSota said of the ACORN-generated voter registrations.