Twin trouble for Julian Castro... or honest misunderstanding?

Via Cincinnatus at The Jeffersonian, I learned this morning that the front-running mayoral candidate here in San Antonio is in a bit of hot water as a result of an "appearance" at a Fiesta event earlier this week:

People watching the River Parade on Monday may have thought they were seeing mayoral candidate Julián Castro waving as the San Antonio City Council barge floated down the waterway.

But if they did, they were wrong.

Julián Castro was hosting a neighborhood association meeting that night in District 7, which he still represents. His identical twin brother, Joaquin Castro, was on the boat.

The situation smacked of politicking, said Carroll Schubert, the District 9 city councilman who also is running for mayor.

"When people were yelling 'Julián, Julián,' (Joaquin) was waving madly, and when they announced all of us as council members, he was also waving," Schubert said.

"I think it's deceitful and showed very poor judgment."

Castro said members of the City Council frequently bring family members along on the barge ride, and Joaquin "always" goes along with his councilman brother. But, he added, the two brothers never pretend to be each other.

"Joaquin could never impersonate me. He's not good looking enough," Castro joked.

Unlike Cincinnatus, I don't think this was underhanded, and I don't think it is a big deal, because I do not believe that Castro set out to deceive anyone. 

Julian Castro is the clear frontrunner now, just a couple weeks out from the election, and would have to be politically stupid to pull such a stunt, especially right in front of Schubert, one of his two opponents.  So I actually believe Castro's explanation:

“My brother campaigned for me; he doesn’t campaign as me,” said the mayoral hopeful at the news conference.

He says he planned on going to the parade but attended a neighborhood meeting instead. He says word of his absence failed to get to the announcer, who told the crowd Julián was on board.

Now, with his brother at his side, he finds some humor in looking alike and yet different. They pointed out that Julián has more hair, Joaquin wears his shirts a little baggier, and Julián is five pounds heavier.

“We just hope that everybody understands that we are twins, God made us that way, and our mother is glad to have us that way. It is one of the blessings in life to have a twin, but we never impersonate each other.”

Both of Castro's opponents have leaped on this incident, judging from quotes in the press.  In the article above, Schubert calls Castro's alleged behavior "deceitful" and says it "showed very poor judgement," while in a CNN article Hardberger is paraphrased as calling it dishonest and deceptive.  But such attacks are to be expected of trailing candidates, and are not evidence of anything, in my opinion.

As best I can tell, this was an honest misunderstanding.  The brothers normally attend the event together.  One couldn't make it.  The announcer didn't get the information.  If the non-candidate brother didn't happen to look very similar to the candidate brother, this would never have been a story.

UPDATE:  For completeness, I should add that at this point I have no strong preference between Julian Castro and Phil Hardberger in the race for mayor.  My only preference is that one of those two, and not Carroll Schubert, win.

Comments

[LoB]

I'm coming down on the side of the argument that this was deceitful. He knew that others would view his twin brother as himself, and that was just fine with him.

[Mike Thomas]

Today, they will appear on ABC's "Good Morning America," CBS' "The Early Show," NBC's "Today" show and CNN's "Crossfire." Appearances are scheduled for "Inside Edition" and "Dateline NBC."
They may even fly to New York to be guests on the Late Show with David Letterman next week...

(BANG!!!!) That was the sound of Schubert and Hardberger shooting themselves in the foot....

[Peter]

Amusing fallout from this. Thanks for pointing me to that, Mike.

[Buhallin]

This is the first time I've seen Schubert's quote about Joaquin waving...

What the heck does he expect? Who the heck is ever on a parade float, and DOESN'T wave? Was he supposed to wave MOST of the time, but stop whenever the announcer said "Julian", or mentioned the city council? Maybe we could make it like a game of musical chairs - "Oh, sorry, you were still waving when I finished the name, you're off the float!"

[Peter]

Yes, Joaquin waving while on the float is hardly evidence of any duplicity. That's what everyone on a float does. This is one reason why I think this event was ludicrously overblown.

[Nancy]

Old stuff I know but that float thing was the first time I ever heard of the Castro twins. And it left a bad taste. Of course they were trying to fake out the voters. Before the twins realized it was going to be a national scandal, Julian admitted that Joaquin stood in for him because he had other plans. If that's not intent to deceive, I don't know what is. I'm glad Julian lost and I hope Joaquin follows. Those boys need to grow up before they show up on my doorstep asking for a vote.

[Carlos]

This shows very poor judgement and I cannot believe San Antonio just voted Julian mayor. I think I have to move now. My only consolation is that the voter turnout was barely 11%.