New Mexico Megachurch Pastor's Candidate Endorsements Test Johnson Amendment Days Before Election
Pastor Steve Smothermon of Legacy Church backed two candidates for office while a federal appeal over the 1954 ban on church campaign endorsements is still pending.
See where this is ›ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. —
Pastor Steve Smothermon of Legacy Church, a nondenominational congregation with nine locations across New Mexico, has publicly endorsed two candidates ahead of Tuesday's Nov. 3 election, The Christian Post reported Sunday. The endorsements put the church at the center of the dispute over the Johnson Amendment, the 1954 federal law that bars tax-exempt nonprofits, including churches, from endorsing candidates or taking part in campaigns.
See where this is ›According to The Christian Post, Smothermon endorsed Greg Cunningham, a Republican challenging Rep. Gabriel Vasquez, a New Mexico Democrat, in mid-August. He told his congregation that Cunningham had served the church for 14 years and shared its biblical values. “Let's pray for him, support his campaign, get registered, and vote to flip this seat,” Smothermon said, according to a passage from The Guardian reproduced by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. On Oct. 6, he endorsed Republican Gregg Hull for governor on social media and urged followers to vote their biblical worldview.
Smothermon told The Guardian that limits on political speech are unconstitutional and that the church could not stay silent during COVID-19-era government restrictions. “For the last 2.5 centuries, resisting censorship has been a cornerstone of our republic,” he said, as quoted by The Christian Post. He also said the church earns its tax status through social work that “actually works.”
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee criticized Cunningham for accepting the endorsement. Spokesperson Anna Elsasser said in an Oct. 30 statement that “he has no qualms receiving endorsements from extreme individuals and organizations,” and the committee pointed to past controversies connected to the church. The Christian Post said Legacy Church did not immediately respond to its request for comment.
This is not the church's first brush with the issue. The Christian Post reported that the church handed out sample ballots highlighting preferred candidates in 2014, and that Smothermon urged support for local candidates in 2021 and 2022. In 2022, he encouraged votes for Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Ronchetti, and the Freedom From Religion Foundation later filed a complaint with the IRS.
The legal question is unsettled. In July 2025, the IRS joined a motion for a consent judgment in a suit brought by National Religious Broadcasters, Intercessors for America and two Texas congregations, Sand Springs Church and First Baptist Church Waskom. The proposal would have let churches endorse candidates when speaking to their own congregations. U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker of the Eastern District of Texas ruled in March 2026 that he could not approve it. The Justice Department filed a brief at the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in September.
What we don't know yet: Legacy Church had not responded to The Christian Post's request for comment, and the sources do not report any IRS action on the endorsements. The 5th Circuit has not been reported to have ruled. Watchman News could not read The Guardian's original report directly and relied on The Christian Post and the committee's statement for its contents.
