While it is conceded that the effect of the INC's bloc vote might be influential in local elections where the winning margin can only amount to a few hundred votes, the potency of it has yet to be tested convincingly in national races. The INC usually announces its endorsements around a week before election day "when the rankings of the candidates in the polls have stabilized" and candidates' rankings in opinion polls seem to be an important factor on how the INC chooses candidates to support. Allen Surla, professor at
De La Salle University pointed out that the INC bloc-voting has served the sect well "since they are able to negotiate with politicians' concessions that otherwise would have been denied of less organized groups." For local positions, they can bargain for the employment of their own members, in exchange for perpetual political support. "They may ask the mayor or the governor that a certain percentage of the employment be given to INC members," Surla said. But INC spokesman Edwil Zabala, in a separate interview, strongly denied that the INC bloc-vote has strings attached to it. "We vote, that's it. It is one of the misconceptions that after voting, we do other things. Those who assert that, they should be the ones providing proof for their assertion. We vote, that's all." Bloc voting is also only practiced inside the Philippines and has never been practiced by members abroad given that election laws existing within their respective countries might bar it. An example in the United States is the
Johnson Amendment, a provision in the
U.S. tax code since 1954 that prohibits all
501(c)(3) non-profit organizations from endorsing or opposing political candidates. INC has presence in the United States as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, and a conduct of bloc voting there similar to their churches in the Philippines will violate the Johnson Amendment that may lead to
Internal Revenue Service investigations and a warrant of revocation of tax-exempt status. ==Criticism==