I wear several hats professionally. I get paid to create art and love to doodle. I get paid to provide technology services, my bread-and-butter. And, although I get paid around a couple of thousand dollars annually in advertising dollars and from the support from my readers – thank you – I consider my writing on these pages to be a profession because, like it or not, I provide a service to the community.
While wearing several hats I try my best to keep the various pieces of my professions apart from each other, and from my personal life. Sometimes, however, some or all of them collide together forcing me to take a step back and breathe some sanity back into my life.
Last week my professional work in political branding collided against the political shenanigans that I often write about putting me in the conundrum of wondering if writing a first-person account of what happened served the purpose of exposing the behind-the-scenes political maneuvers that seldom sees the light of day, or was it my need to write this simply because I perceived an attack on my art.
Take this narrative for what it’s worth to you, my ego defending my art, exposing behind-the-scenes political shenanigans, or a little of both.
Strap in because this is going to be a long journey so that I can layout the various pieces together, so it makes sense to you. I’ll explain how we got here, what happened, and what it means from my perspective. Along the way, I’ll explain why this little episode is nothing more than the typical shenanigans Socorro is known for – lest we forget that Socorro is home to the Gandara dynasty of two former mayors, father and son who served time for public corruption and another son who went to jail for trafficking marihuana while a sitting county commissioner.
That this came out of Socorro shouldn’t surprise anyone.
It started with me designing a political campaign logo for a candidate. Like all branding projects I work on as part of my work in Politico Campaigns, I undertook to understand the candidate, what their personal story is, what are they like and what will make them resonate among the voters. Running for office is standing out among a sea of candidates, some running against you and others running for other offices because at the end of the day, a candidate’s future depends on a voter going down the ballot and selecting their name from a sea of other candidates. To do my job, I need to make their name jump out from all the other names on the ballot influencing the voter to vote for them.
In this election cycle, the dynamics of the November election have fundamentally changed. We know that the Democrats will be the voters casting votes in and around El Paso. We also know that it will be women leading the charge. But what we don’t know is by how much of a bump women candidates will get from Kamala Harris on the ticket and how the traditional voter makeup will change because of Harris.
I normally work on municipal and school board races and in this election cycle the voter analytics have been fundamentally changed. For local municipal elections two major changes are at play. This is not the first November election where municipal offices are in contention, it happened in 2020. That year, however, is an anomaly because of the pandemic, making previous voter analytics for local races centered on smaller voter data set of voters invalid.
In November, among the voters are the traditional voters that will be voting for a president and other national and statewide offices. The Democrats will win in El Paso and surrounding communities because that is the reality, and no amount of wishful thinking will change that. As such, the traditional November voter will be voting for Democrats. But for this time around three things have come together to dramatically change how ballots are cast and who will cast them.
The first is that there is no straight ticket voting, meaning that voters will have to go down the ballot and individually select the candidate they want. It is more than likely that the voters will select anyone with a D on their name.
This is where things get a little interesting. As the voter goes down the ballot, they’ll get to a list of candidates without the D or the R, stop and decide who they will mark based on name recognition. Many of the voters won’t know “Juan” from “Jane” unless they’ve heard “Jane” spent too much on gasoline, or “Juan” is some guy running for mayor.
Most voters will pick down ballot candidates on how they perceive the name they see on the ballot. Is it a good perception or a bad one? This brings us to the third dynamic in this race, the women and to a lesser extent minority voters, because of Kamala Harris.
Will more voters turn out to vote because they want to say I voted for the first female president and will women, who traditionally turn out more than men, vote for the women candidates on the ballot? All the political gurus are running calculus scenarios in hopes of figuring this out, but no one really knows what is going to happen.
Whether more women turn out or women candidates get a bump on the ballot is anyone’s guess but what any political observer will agree is that the voters will likely vote on name recognition.
This is where “Juan” or “Jane” need to stand out with the voter. This is where political branding, i.e. the candidate’s logo and the colors are important to anyone running for office. For women candidates, making sure voters know they are a woman won’t hurt them even if Kamala Harris doesn’t move the needle on the border.
What Happened With My Artwork
We’ve all heard the stories of backroom deals or political operatives operating in the shadows in each political cycle, but how they happen and firsthand accounts are rare because the politicians and the operatives would rather keep the shenanigans in the shadows and in whispers.
As an artist, the biggest gratification for me is when a piece of art becomes the center of attention. For an artist, an art piece that causes a reaction is the best form of flattery. There’s no good or bad attention, it’s just attention/reaction as far as the artist is concerned.
For the candidate it is something else.
I was contacted by the candidate I created a logo for because they received an email from a Catholic Church official asking that the candidate change their campaign logo because “it would jeprodize [sic] our tax exempt status.”
As an artist who is paid for my work, I have the responsibility to ensure that what I create does not infringe on copyright law, in other words I didn’t simply copy someone else’s work and sold it as my own. I also have an obligation to make sure that what I create for my client serves the intended purpose.
For example, most campaign logos are red, white, and blue, for obvious reasons, and most have the traditional political campaign symbology you see all the time, like the stars. As an artist, that’s boring. In El Paso, the star and the franklin mountains symbolize the region. These symbols are called iconography. They are used to connect the candidate to the voters.
My practice when designing a campaign logo is to ensure that, one it stands out in a sea of political signs, and two that it makes voters look and make the connection to the name so that they remember it as they go down the ballot. When commissioned to create campaign branding, I generally present the candidate with several mockups and we work together to finalize the final logo from there.
There are political consultants and pundits that will argue that a logo does little to nothing for a political candidate. Many will minimize the branding efforts as nonessential focusing instead on targeting voters to get them to the polls. In an election like the one in November where the local races are overshadowed by the presidential elections and the ballots have long lists of names the voters will have to remember among many other names, the name of the candidate. A candidate simply needs to stand out in a sea of names. A logo starts the process and is essential to name recognition.
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Don’t believe it? Then I’ll let a 2018 study by The University of Pennsylvania put this to rest.
Although the study looked at how political bias affects how people misinterpret scientific data with their political bias, the study found that the “exposure to the logos of political parties,” will “significantly reduce social learning.” According to the study, political identity drives people to interpret scientific climate data differently but when the data is presented outside of the context of political markers like logos, people agreed on what the data meant. [see note 1 below]
The logos of the political parties were used as the cues for political identity demonstrating the power that party logos have over people. Images are an effective means of political persuasion.
This is what a logo in the political context is supposed to do, drive the voters to make a political decision based on the logo’s representation of the candidate.
A well-crafted logo should evoke an emotion. It is hoped that the emotion it evokes in the voter is the name recognition of the candidate who hopes the emotion leads to a vote.
This is what I did for this candidate.
The Steeple Offense
My client received an email from Emanuel Alcazar asking him to remove the steeple from his logo, the central piece of the candidate’s logo that connected him to the community he wished to represent as mayor. Exactly what my intent was when I designed the logo.
Opening the email sent to my client had me thinking, someone is asserting a frivolous copyright claim of which I see many. Filing copyright claims has become a tool to silence dissent or just to annoy.
But in this case, it wasn’t a copyright claim, but rather an absurd claim that an icon would somehow cause someone to lose their non-profit status because someone may think – highly unlikely – a steeple, an icon of Socorro, is tantamount to a political endorsement.
Yes, that is what is being alleged.
A church steeple cannot be construed to endorse someone just like the Whitehouse in a campaign logo cannot be construed to endorse a presidential candidate. As a matter of fact, the Obama Administration had to address the use of official Whitehouse pictures in political advertising in 2012. When a picture is shared by the Whitehouse, it is accompanied by a warning that the image should not be used “in commercial or political materials,” or used in a manner “that in any way suggests approval or endorsement of the President, the First Family, or the White House.” In a response to a question from the press about the prohibitions against using the Whitehouse official pictures in political advertising, Obama’s Principal Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest “hinted, the White House’s warning against use of official photos is mostly bluster,” according to Politico.
Moreover, as Politico explains, “claiming a false political endorsement isn’t illegal,” either.
Since the Church, at least the local diocese seems to suggest that a steeple is sufficient to have their nonprofit status taken away, I wondered why stop there and ask the candidate to stop using his last name, after all, the cross is an essential icon of the Catholic Church, and cruz is Spanish for a cross.
The Cross
Poignantly, Rudy’s last name is Cruz, as in a cross. The cross is the symbol of Christianity and the Catholic Church. As the emblematic symbol of Christianity and believing for a moment that Cruz’ use of the “steeple, similar to that of the Socorro Mission” may “jeopardize” the Church’s non-profit status, should we also expect Cruz to not use his last name as it could be misconstrued by voters as an endorsement by Christians across the globe? Surely not!
If the candidate were to give in to the request to remove the steeple from his logo at the request of the Catholic Diocese of El Paso, then why stop there? Why not take the next step and change his last name because wouldn’t it suggest, that the cross signifies that he is being endorsed by Christ himself?
Voters are intelligent individuals who can critically analyze a situation and draw their own conclusions of who or what (a steeple?) is endorsing a candidate for office, but apparently the diocese doesn’t trust the voters to be intelligent enough to discern that the steeple is not an endorsement.
The Monkey In The Room – Copyrights
In creating logos and other materials the intellectual property of others must be respected. Copyright law protects artists like me but is also abused. As soon as you put something on paper you generally own the copyright to it. There is often a misunderstanding about Fair Use and what is in the public domain. The rule of thumb is that a graphic no matter where it is, probably has a copyright attached to it. It is complex and ever changing. In 2011, even a monkey held the copyright to his selfie for a while.
Naruto, a macaque monkey took a selfie with a camara. Copyright law now says that only people can own a copyright, but at the time that Naruto took his selfie it wasn’t clear who owned the copyright.
The owner of the camera argued that he owned the copyright because it was his camera. Copyright law is based on the idea of who created the image/idea without regard to who owns the equipment used to create the material. PETA, on behalf of Naruto, argued that the monkey owned the copyright. At stake was the money the picture could generate. In the end, the court ruled that only people could own the copyright and Naruto’s selfie ended up in the public domain for all intents and purposes.
But pictures and music aren’t the only things that can be copyrighted. Believe it or not, a building can be copyrighted. The 1990 Architectural Works Copyright Protection Act added buildings and architectural plans to copyright protection. Most people do not realize that a property release is needed to use pictures of buildings in commercial works if a copyright is asserted.
But there are important caveats before the diocese starts thinking, aha, the Socorro Mission is now copyrighted by us. The copyright of a building is for things that are not visible from a public place, for example a portion of the church that is not open to the public. But more important is that the copyright of buildings only applies to buildings created on or after December 1, 1990.
The Socorro Mission was established in 1843.
As an artist working on commercial and political branding, these are the type of things I get paid to know to protect the interests of my clients. It is for this reason that I take any challenge to my work seriously.
Each election cycle there are questions about copyright, fair use and how candidates use music or newscasts in their messaging.
I routinely use news reports in the political mailers I create for my clients and invariably an opponent or two gets mad and complains about the mailer arguing it was illegally used. It isn’t but that doesn’t stop them from complaining.
But the question remains, can the logo I designed lead to the church losing its nonprofit status?
How To Lose A Nonprofit Status
Can the church lose its nonprofit status because of the logo I created as asserted by Emanuel Alcazar? The answer lies in how the IRS perceives the “endorsement.” According to the IRS, 501(c)(3) organizations “are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office.”
The IRS adds that “certain activities or expenditures may not be prohibited depending on the facts and circumstances.” The key being “the facts and circumstances.”
In this case, they are simple. I designed the logo because the mission is an icon of Socorro, and the candidate is running for office in Socorro. Alcazar and the diocese had no input whatsoever in the design of the logo, I know because I created it.
But here’s an interesting fact to the story that already has facts and intrigue driving it.
The IRS is notorious for keeping out of the political arena when it comes to churches “breaking the law and endorsing in elections,” according to the Texas Tribune. The El Paso Diocese is part of EPISO, an El Paso organization notorious for holding “accountability” sessions for political candidates, which are in effect endorsing candidates that agree to support them. Office holders have been threatened if they did not support EPISO tax dollar funding requests.
To believe for one second that the local diocese is concerned about losing its non-profit status because it may be construed as an endorsement ignores the decades of the local Catholic Church not only endorsing politicians but helping them get elected on the promise of voting to use tax dollars for EPISO. In 2014, Bishop Mark Seitz admitted that “EPISO is almost exclusively Catholic.”
But a priest doesn’t speak for the church, or does he?
I asked Emanuel Alcazar for a comment for this article in an email which I copied to the diocese bishop’s office. Before anyone assumes I’m not cognizant that sometimes my different professional hats collide, I introduced myself and explained that I was writing an article about the logo controversy and was seeking a comment. I also added that I am the artist who designed the logo in my email.
Alcazar did not respond to me but Fernando Ceniceros, the Director of Communications for the Catholic Diocese of El Paso responded to my query. Ceniceros was succinct. He wrote that “at this time the letter Fr. Emmaneul sent has the full support of the Diocese of El Paso,” and “is sufficient for any further comment at this time.”
Ceniceros closed the door on me so I couldn’t ask him if the email that Alcazar sent wasn’t, itself, political persuasion that they were afraid would cost them their nonprofit status.
Can The Email Be Construed As Politicking Violating Church’s Non-Profit Status?
The email that Alcazar sent to the candidate explaining that his logo somehow “may give the impression” that the Socorro Mission and its leadership endorses the candidate, can, itself be construed as the priest and the diocese taking sides in the Socorro mayoral election by asking that one of the candidates change their campaign logo.
Prior to the email and as far as I know, there was no inference that the diocese had taken an interest in the mayoral election, much less take a side in it. Although it is not known how the priest, Alcazar, become aware of the candidate’s signs and use of the steeple, it is possible it was brought to his attention by someone. If so, by whom and for what purpose?
Can we simply believe that Alcazar was simply walking down the street, saw the sign and immediately exclaimed to himself, “oh no, we’re in trouble because the IRS is going to swoop down and take away our tax-free status!”
Or is it more likely that someone – like maybe a political operative or even an opponent – understood the significance of one of Socorro’s icons cementing for the voters that Cruz is a child of Socorro?
Who Did It?
We don’t know if Alcazar sent the email on his own behalf or was he prompted to by others. He has not said if anyone compelled him to. But we may take a guess based on a letter released by Rudy Cruz. Yesterday evening Cruz posted on his social media account a letter from his attorney that may provide clues as to who may have been behind the request for him to remove the steeple from his logo.
The letter dated August 20, 2024 was sent by the law firm of Scott Hulse to Yvonne Colon-Villalobos. Colon-Villalobos is the Socorro City Council District 4 representative. In the letter Cruz accuses Colon-Villalobos of sending a text message to Socorro residents accusing Cruz of criminal acts. In the letter, Cruz denies the accusations levied by her and demands that she publish a retraction and issue a signed written apology by August 22.
As of this morning Colon-Villalobos has not complied with the demand to retract her statements or issue an apology.
The attorney’s letter adds that Colon-Villalobos’ “actions are simply a translucent attempt to derail Mr. Cruz’s campaign for mayor of Socorro by fabricating lies, hoping that the residents of Socorro will not vote for him.”
I don’t know if Colon-Villalobos discussed the steeple with Emanuel Alcazar, but the attorney’s demand letter suggests that she wants to derail my client’s run for office making her the prime suspect for complaining about the steeple in the logo to the priest.
That makes the most sense to me, but you, reader, are free to draw your own conclusion. As for me, I’ll just savor the moment that one of my logos evoked such a strong emotion that a priest felt the need to write an email asking for its removal with the local diocese in full support. It’s exactly what my logo was intended to do, bring attention to my client’s run for office.
This article was corrected on August 31, 2024 to correct the year of the founding of the Socorro Mission.
Note:
- Douglas Guilbeault, Joshua Becker and Damon Centola, “Social learning and partisan bias in the interpretation of climate trends,” The Annenberg School for Communication, The University of Pennsylvania, August 3, 2018.