Group denies Block endorsement

PRC candidate's support on LULAC stationery an apparent 'misunderstanding'

Doug Mattson | The New Mexican

10/22/2008 - 10/23/08

Jerome Block Jr. has claimed he has the endorsement of the country's largest Hispanic organization.

The League of United Latin American Citizens gets top billing on the Public Regulation Commission candidate's Web site, and Block said at this week's forum that the group is backing him.

One problem: LULAC doesn't do endorsements, and both its state director and headquarters in Washington, D.C., want the group's name off the campaign's Web site.

State director Pablo Martinez said confusion arose after Felipe Archuleta, the group's former state civil rights chairman, sent a letter endorsing Block on Martinez's LULAC stationery without Martinez's knowledge when he was in California. "I was pretty surprised, pretty pissed off to say the least, that anyone would use my name like that," Martinez said.

"I was going to support Block as a person," he added. "I always support people who are family friends, but not as part of LULAC."

In an e-mail to Block on Wednesday asking for LULAC's removal from the Web site, Martinez wrote: "I discussed this situation with the staff member and he is very contrite for this decision of using my stationery. I did not sign this letter and my endorsement was not given to you under this capacity. I did inform the former staff member that I did support you only in a private and un-official capacity. ... I understand your concern and because you received this letter, you believed that in good faith you received an endorsement."

In response, Block said, "I respect Mr. Martinez's request, and our campaign will honor it."

Reached earlier in the day, Block noted he received the May 13 endorsement letter during the primary. "And it's good for the general (election)," he said.

Block provided a copy of the letter, which has Martinez and Archuleta's name at the bottom but no signatures. It ends by saying, "We are proud to endorse a qualified and honest candidate that will always, aside of his family, make the citizens a priority and work for their best interest in Northern New Mexico."

Archuleta, who lives in Las Cruces, said, "If anyone is to blame, it's me, because I think (Block) misunderstood me. ... It was me, nobody else."

He supports Block, he said, "because I think he would make a good PRC person, and I also know his family. I've known his grandfather and father and him and talked to him on the phone before. I'm from the north; I'm originally from Taos, and I still carry the northern part of the state in my heart."

Block's father and grandfather were both elected as state regulators.

LULAC state director Martinez's Wednesday request to remove the group's name from Block's Web site comes more than a week after he told the Las Vegas Optic, on Oct. 14, that he would seek the name's removal.

A LULAC spokesman in Washington, D.C., Lizette Jenness Olmos, called The New Mexican on Wednesday because she was trying to reach Block to get him to take LULAC off his Web site. "He has us on his Web site, but we don't endorse candidates, so I don't know why he has our name on there," she said.

LULAC national executive director Brent Wilkes said confusion sometimes arises between the national and local offices. In one case, he said, President Bush issued a news release saying he had LULAC's backing. It turned out a conservative member of the group in Florida had endorsed Bush.

Wilkes said his group's constitution prohibits it from making political endorsements and seating officers who already hold elected positions.

LULAC has been around more than 75 years and says it advocates for Hispanics on economic, educational, civil rights and other issues.

Contact Doug Mattson at 986-3087 or dmattson@sfnewmexican.com.