The Hispanic Campaign former US president Donald Trump categorically denied this Monday having any link with Víctor López, the Spanish political strategist who collaborated until January this year with Colombian presidential candidate Rodolfo Hernández.
(Read here: ‘Rodolfo is what the Americans call an ‘outsider’, says his strategist)
In conversation with this newspaper, Giancarlo Sopo, who directed Trump’s Hispanic national advertising during the 2020 electoral process, assured that no one on his team has any idea who López is.
(See also: Former adviser to Trump and Bukele talks about his relationship with Rodolfo)
In various media outlets and news agencies, including EFE, Forbes, Iberianpress, Prnoticias and this same newspaper, it has been appearing for some time that López worked on the Trump campaign where he was entrusted with the task of reaching out to Hispanics.
In fact, there is a statement in circulation from Kayros, López’s own advisory firm where he serves as president and founder, in which they attribute this role.
As the saying goes, victories have a hundred fathers, and unfortunately, it’s common for consultants to exaggerate their roles in campaigns
“Perhaps it is all a misunderstanding, but none of the members of President Trump’s Latino team know who Mr. López is, and we would surely remember him because we communicated constantly. As the saying goes, victories have a hundred fathers, and unfortunately, it is It’s common for consultants to exaggerate their roles in campaigns and some even make them up out of thin air. I understand why someone would want to take credit for President Trump’s huge success with Hispanics, but even those of us who really worked on that strategy would never do that. Self-promotion seems crude, unprofessional and overshadows the candidates. In addition, the reality is that it was the president himself who marked the way,” Sopo told EL TIEMPO.López’s name came to light last week after Hernández denied that he had been an adviser to his campaign.
Initially, the campaign released a statement saying that the strategist, who also claims to have worked in the electoral campaign of the president of El Salvador Nayib Bukele and many others, had visited them in October of last year to make an offer, which was rejected.
That as a result of a trill from López in which he congratulated him on his passage to the second round and showed gratitude for having contributed to that success.
Subsequently, Hernández released a second statement in which he admitted that the adviser collaborated with them “intermittently” until the end of January of this year, but without the existence of an economic contract between the two.
EL TIEMPO contacted Kayros to clarify his alleged role in the Trump campaign. According to Kayros, although the firm “reserves the right not to report on any of the clients we work with”, if they could confirm “That Mr. Víctor López has not been an adviser to the Trump campaign for Latin America.”
And, also, that “the company Kayros Group has not issued any statement in this regard”, in relation to a press release dated October 21 of last year, in which apparently Kayros makes the link with this campaign.
That statement was used by several media outlets. to make López’s relationship with Trump. To date, and despite the fact that it has been in circulation for more than six months, neither Kayros nor López had indicated that it was false.
In fact, López himself on his Twitter account highlights a Prnoticias publication in which words from that statement are used verbatim.
The statement attributed to Kayros was distributed by EIN Presswire, an online company that, for a fee, offers to distribute press releases to journalists and news agencies.
The statement is accompanied by the logo of this company, the photo of López and links to its pages on Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin.
On the Kayros website there are other things that stand out. As part of its “Executive Committee” the company mentions that it is made up of 14 people. Among them there are several who appear as directors of offices in Latin American and Caribbean countries, such as Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, as well as their manager in Florida.
In the case of Jamaica it appears as director Gavin Brown; in the Dominican Republic, Lorraine Salazar, and in Florida, Christina Costa.
However, the photos of these three people also appear on other internet portals as the faces of various companies. In Brown’s case at the accounting firm Taskplete and on an Australian website for parents.
Salazar’s photo is for sale at Gettyimages, another Internet company that offers “stock” or generic images for a fee.
As for Costa, her photo appears on the website of a Seattle-based real estate company called The Every Door Team.
TIME spoke again with Kayros to clarify this issue.
According to the firm, its designer decided to use “avatars” instead of real images to preserve his anonymity. In addition, that the Kayros page has been out of date since 2017, that many of them no longer collaborate with the firm and that they were removed from the page as of Monday.
Likewise, that among the 14 members of the Executive Committee, only three avatars were used.
On the other hand, they also decided to eliminate López’s re-tweet from Prnoticias where the link with the Trump campaign is mentioned.
This is the complete text of the representative of the Trump Hispanic campaign
From 2016 to 2020, President Trump’s share of the Hispanic vote grew 9 points, and the 10 counties with the largest swings toward Republicans that year were majority Hispanic. His success has broadened the Republican Party coalition and Hispanics will be very important in our victories this November.
President Trump’s popularity among Hispanics is due to the fact that his policies helped our communities. The group of campaign staff the president assembled to help him share his vision with Latino voters was limited to a few strategists in Washington, DC and Florida. We each develop a specific task. For example, some were in charge of working with elected officials; others organized the spokespersons for the campaign. We work very well as a team.
Perhaps it is all a misunderstanding, but none of the members of President Trump’s Latino team know who Mr. López is, and we would surely remember him because we communicated constantly. As the saying goes, victories have a hundred fathers, and sadly, it’s common for consultants to exaggerate their roles in campaigns, some even inventing them out of thin air. I understand why someone wants to take credit for the great success of President Trump among Hispanics, but even those of us who really work on that strategy would never do it. That kind of self-promotion strikes me as crude, unprofessional, and casts a shadow over the candidates. In addition, the reality is that it was the president himself who marked the way.
– GiancarloSopo is the founder of Visto Media Group, a public relations and marketing firm. In 2020 Sopo led national Hispanic advertising for Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign. He is Cuban-American, born and raised in Miami, Florida.
SERGIO GOMEZ MASERI
Correspondent of THE TIME
Washington
On Twitter @sergom68
More news
#Trump #campaign #denies #link #adviser #Rodolfo #Hernández