Heartbreak Hotel: Johnson ad copyright infringement? - MSNewsNow.com - Jackson, MS
"Hi, I'm Tim Johnson. You may know me as Elvis, and that's great," Tim Johnson says in one of his campaign ads. He's running against incumbent Transportation Commissioner Dick Hall in the Republican primary.
Not everyone's smiling about Johnson's Elvis impersonation. "You got an opponent who thinks he's Elvis," Hall said at the Neshoba County Fair on Wednesday.
And there may be some "Suspicious Minds" at Elvis Enterprises in Memphis.
"We received a call from Elvis Enterprises saying there might be a copyright infringement on a candidate's ad running on our station," says WLBT General Manager Dan Modisett. Modisett says stations are not held liable for what candidates say in their campaign ads, so WLBT is OK.
Johnson tells us Elvis Enterprises never even contacted him about it. "You were really my first call," he tells us.
Johnson and his campaign manager Linda Meeler show us their receipt for $60.50, paid to agent Harry Fox to license the song. The receipt is dated July 14 after the ad started running.
Johnson believes that's fine, as long as it's paid for. "As we got the license through the third party person, we kinda sent everything out... because we wanted to be above board," he tells us.
And no one's questioning his campaign website, where he calls himself "Tim Elvis Johnson". It's another place he uses the Elvis likeness prominently.
Primary elections are August 2.
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