Newspaper Issues Correction After Implying ACORN Video Filmmaker Motivated By Race

The Washington Post and The Associated Press issued corrections Tuesday after implying that the conservative filmmaker who conducted an undercover expose on ACORN was motivated by race.

The Post, in an article Friday on filmmaker James O'Keefe and partner Hannah Giles, was the first to suggest that O'Keefe was motivated to target ACORN because the group registers GOP-opposing minorities to vote. That line was later picked up by the AP.

But the Post, following complaints on conservative blogs, clarified Tuesday that O'Keefe did not say that.

"This article about the community organizing group ACORN incorrectly said that a conservative journalist targeted the organization for hidden-camera videos partly because its voter-registration drives bring Latinos and African Americans to the polls," the newspaper said in its correction, posted on top of the earlier version of the story. "Although ACORN registers people mostly from those groups, the maker of the videos, James E. O'Keefe, did not specifically mention them."

O'Keefe and Giles posed as a pimp and prostitute, visiting ACORN offices across the country to see if ACORN workers would give them advice on how to set up an illegal brothel. Their hidden-camera videos, which showed workers offering tips on how to skirt tax and anti-prostitution laws, caused a political uproar over the group and its federal funding. ACORN named an internal investigator Tuesday to review its operations, as part of a pledge to reform.

The original Washington Post story Friday suggested O'Keefe was racially motivated in his targeting of ACORN -- but did not provide a quote to back that up.

"Though O'Keefe described himself as a progressive radical, not a conservative, he said he targeted ACORN for the same reasons that the political right does: its massive voter registration drives that turn out poor African Americans and Latinos against Republicans," the article said.

It then quoted O'Keefe as saying, "Politicians are getting elected single-handedly due to this organization."

The AP translated that as: "James O'Keefe, one of the two filmmakers, said he went after ACORN because it registers minorities likely to vote against Republicans."

But the AP corrected the record Tuesday afternoon, noting the Post's correction.

"In a Sept. 19 story about the community organizing group ACORN, The Associated Press, based on an account in The Washington Post, erroneously quoted a conservative journalist saying he targeted the organization for hidden-camera videos because its voter-registration drives bring minority voters to the polls," it said.