By John Lyon
Arkansas News Bureau
LITTLE ROCK — Republican John Boozman’s U.S. Senate campaign is scrambling to come up with a new television ad to replace one it withdrew in response to objections from the University of Arkansas.
The 3rd District congressman is challenging Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln’s re-election bid. In his first ad of the general election campaign, Boozman sought to play up his image as a former Razorback football player, but university officials objected to the appearance in the ad of university images and the Razorback logo.
Boozman’s campaign agreed Tuesday night to withdraw the ad after being contacted by the university.
“All our ad buys are on hold for the time being,” campaign spokesman Patrick Creamer said today. “We’re working with our ad agency to get something out. We had bought through this week, but we’re going to be getting something up pretty quick.”
Creamer said the replacement ad may use some material from the pulled ad but will not use university images or the Razorback logo, though he said the campaign believed its use of the images and logo fell under the definition of fair use and did not violate any copyright.
The logo appeared most visibly in the ad on a football helmet.
“We don’t want to create a problem. We understand their concern that it may appear to favor one candidate or another,” Creamer said.
University of Arkansas spokesman Steve Voorhies said the university has policies against unlicensed use of university images or logos in commercials and against their use in any fashion in political campaign ads.
“We want to maintain neutrality,” he said.
Creamer and Voorhies said the campaign had contacted the university and asked for permission to shoot inside Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium, and the request was denied.
Instead, the ad used footage of Boozman standing with the stadium behind him. Creamer said he did not believe the campaign asked for permission to show the stadium in the background or to show the Razorback logo.
