Washed It!

Newly elected Assemblyman Jeff Gorell is on a mission, it just wasn’t the one he expected.

In March, the freshman Republican from Camarillo, a Navy reservist, will trade his business suit for combat fatigues and report for a year’s duty in Afghanistan. Never mind that he hasn’t yet hired a staff, opened an office or introduced legislation.

He’s still working out a more basic question: How will he run his office during his 12-month absence?

Gorell briefly considered asking the Legislature to pass an emergency bill allowing him to nominate a temporary replacement. When it became clear that would violate the state’s constitution, he decided instead to take a leave of absence, relying on staff and friendly Republican colleagues to attend to business in his Ventura County district.

The former prosecutor and college lecturer, 40, acknowledges it’s not the ideal way to launch a political career. But he’s accepted his pending deployment with the same earnestness that has made him widely appealing in his conservative-leaning 37th district.

“It’s a misfortune of timing,” said Gorell, a moderate who’s holding office for the first time. He easily defeated Democrat Ferial Masry for the district covering Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark and Simi Valley. “I’m going to work really hard to prove that I will be the hardest-working legislator in the building. I’ll get as much done in 31/2 months as most do in 12.”

Gorell is the first legislator in California to be deployed for active duty since World War II, though legislators in other states have found themselves in the same predicament 51 times since Sept. 11, 2001, according to the chief clerk of the Assembly’s office.

Army Reservist Tom Umberg was absent from the final months of his 2004 campaign for the Assembly as he helped prosecute terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. But the Orange County Democrat was back home by the time his Assembly term began.

Federal and state laws mandate that Gorell can return to his job once his tour ends. But states are handling what to do in legislators’ absence in different ways. Texas and five other states allow for a temporary fill-in. Legislator-soldiers in Pennsylvania, on the other hand, have taken leaves of absence.

A California military code written during the Korean War mentions the option of a temporary replacement if the Legislature authorizes it. But the state has never taken that step, Gorell said, and after consulting with lawyers he determined it probably wouldn’t be legal because the state’s constitution says vacancies must be filled by special election.

Assembly Speaker John A. P

As Nevadans streamed to the polls Tuesday morning, Sen. Harry Reid gave handshakes and hugs to volunteers phone-banking in a Las Vegas campaign office, which was down the street from an apartment complex touting its “Recession Special!”

The embattled Democrat was notably relaxed, considering his battle with Republican Sharron Angle has been so filled with mud-slinging that a radio station Tuesday dubbed the pair “Dirty Harry” and “Psycho Sharron.”

Dressed in a button-down shirt and khaki pants, Reid joked about being scheduled to serve the volunteers doughnuts, a box of which had been opened in a different room. While in high school, Reid said, he worked part of the year at a Henderson, Nev., bakery glazing baked goods.

“Even today, I can’t stand the smell of doughnuts,” he said to laughter.

Reid told reporters — who outnumbered volunteers — that his team estimated nearly two-thirds of ballots had been cast in two weeks of early voting, during which he’d done “extremely well.” He also bragged about his “second-to-none” turnout operation, whose effectiveness will likely determine the razor-close race. (Indeed, the office lobby had a poster labeled “getting out the vote to victory.” A drawing of a thermometer had been colored in just below a line marked “800 shifts.”)

“We feel comfortable where we are,” Reid said, a sentiment he’s repeated often in recent days, even as public polls showed Angle gaining momentum. Reid, who’s been endorsed by numerous GOP rainmakers, said he’d likely peeled off support from moderate Republicans alarmed at Angle’s conservative “tea party” beliefs.

“They don’t want a Republican Party with her brand on it,” he said, but instead coveted GOP leaders in line with Ronald Reagan and President George H.W. Bush.

A comic strip riffing on “Peanuts” taped to the office wall — called “It’s A Tough Election, Harry Reid” — summed up what the Reid considered the race’s “clear choice” between the powerful Senate majority leader and a Republican prone to lightning-rod statements. Reid was portrayed as Charlie Brown and Angle as Lucy.

“Harry Reid, stop being lazy like the unemployed and try to kick this football,” Angle says.

Unlike Charlie Brown, Reid nails the kick. “Good grief, you’re a terrible candidate,” he says.

ashley.powers@latimes.com
In campaign’s closing hours, a relaxed Harry Reid hands out handshakes, hugs and doughnuts

As candidates count down the hours to election day, many campaigns are bracing for the possibility that it may take weeks before the final results are known. And that’s before the lawyers have their say.

In several states that host what may prove to be decisive contests for the House and Senate, elections officials say a definitive vote count may not be known until well after Nov. 2.

In Washington, for instance, all but 2% of ballots are expected to be cast by mail. With polls showing Sen. Patty Murray locked in a tight race with Republican Dino Rossi, it may be those votes arriving after election day that tip the balance.

“We do have a sense for the dramatic here in Washington,” said Secretary of State Sam Reed.

His office is also preparing for the possibility of a recount, which would automatically occur if the two leading candidates are separated by a margin within 0.5%. Recount laws vary by state, and in several, losing candidates have to pick up the tab if they seek one.

In Alaska, simply tallying the votes presents an additional challenge because of the write-in candidacy of Sen. Lisa Murkowski. Write-in ballots won’t be counted until mid-November, if officials decide it is necessary to do so.

For Rossi, a recount may provide a sense of d

Democrat Kendrick Meek reasserted on Friday that he was in Florida’s three-way Senate race to stay, despite reports that he had been urged to withdraw in favor of Gov. Charlie Crist.

Meek took to the airwaves in the morning to deny reports that former President Clinton had urged Meek to withdraw so that Crist would stand a better chance of defeating Marco Rubio, the Republican nominee who is a “tea party” movement favorite.

“I told him I didn’t have any thoughts about getting out of the race,” Meek said of Clinton on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “He didn’t encourage me to get out of the race.”

Meek made similar statements exonerating Clinton on the other morning shows and Clinton himself weighed in later in the day, reaffirming his support.

“We did talk last week following a rally in Orlando about the race and its challenges,” Clinton stated. “I didn’t ask Kendrick to leave the race, nor did Kendrick say that he would. I told him that how he proceeds was his decision to make and that I would support him regardless.”

It may take three points to define a plane, but in politics, three-way races are notoriously unstable — as the battle in Florida illustrates.

Crist, once a rising star in the GOP, was forced to run as an independent when it became clear he could not win his party’s primary against Rubio, who is far more conservative, especially on social issues such as abortion rights and stem-cell research.

Meek, a Democratic congressman, won his primary against businessman Jeff Greene, setting up a three-way race among an African American Democrat, a moderate Republican running as an independent and a staunch conservative Republican supported by the tea party wing.

There have been numerous reports that top Democrats would have been happy to see Meek withdraw, clearing the way for Crist, who famously hugged President Obama, to gather the anti-Rubio vote in one column. Polls show Rubio with a solid lead over Crist, with Meek running a distant third.

Part of the rationale is also based on the arithmetic of the Senate, where the GOP is hoping to at least increase its influence and perhaps win a majority. The Florida seat is held by a Republican, and Crist has been careful to avoid saying with which party he would caucus during the organization of the post-election Senate. Two independents already caucus with the Democrats and are key members of the Democratic majority.

The Florida race would not be the first in which top Democrats, seeking to save the Senate, got involved in local races.

During the primaries, there were reports that White House aides had discussions about a job for Joe Sestak if he dropped his bid to unseat Sen. Arlen Specter, a fellow Democrat. Sestak went on to win the primary and is locked in a close race with Republican Pat Toomey.

Michael.muskal@latimes.com

Twitter.com/LATimesmuskal
Democratic candidate denies Bill Clinton urged him to quit Florida Senate contest

It wasn’t tough decisions on California’s ailing schools, or the prison crisis or the direction of healthcare reform that kept lawmakers locked in chambers for more than 20 hours before they finally passed the latest budget in state history Friday morning.

What bedeviled the process of approving the $125-billion spending plan was such matters as whether electronic highway billboards should have advertisements, whether a big political donor should be appointed to a state commission, whose name should adorn a disaster-relief bill, and whether the state needs a paid secretary of volunteerism.

The vote was supposed to be easy, a bipartisan election-year feint that pushed tough decisions into the future, papering over the deficit with clever accounting.

The budget lawmakers passed would keep state services at the status quo, with a freeze on school spending, modest trims to healthcare programs and some new money for universities.

It assumes billions of dollars in federal aid that most experts agree will never materialize and relies on loans and bookkeeping maneuvers such as transfers and funding shifts.

Yet the approval process became an all-night affair, with tens of millions of dollars in transportation spending lost because lawmakers had a spat over electronic billboards and DUI checkpoints.

Some Democrats disliked a provision to sell advertising space for soft drinks, automobiles or other products alongside the flashing alerts about abducted children and hazardous road conditions on the more than 700 state-owned electronic freeway billboards. The proposal was pushed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

“Who thinks it’s a good idea to give drivers one more reason to take their eyes off the road?” said Sen. Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto). He chairs a budget subcommittee that initially rejected the plan, which was later reinserted into the budget by legislative leaders.

Sen. Gil Cedillo (D-Los Angeles) sought to make the multi-provision bill more palatable by adding a new measure. It addressed an element of alleged corruption in Bell, where the city was reported to be making money by towing the cars of sober immigrants from DUI checkpoints if they did not have proper ID.

Without a provision banning such a practice, Cedillo was refusing to vote for it and other parts of the budget, which was contained in 21 bills. Democrats added it. Some Republicans said the proposal could interfere with legitimate law-enforcement actions, and the bill failed to garner enough votes to pass. So the Senate killed the entire $112-million transportation bill.

Just after dawn, an impromptu hearing was needed to get a bill authorizing schools funding back on track. GOP senators were refusing to put up the votes for it, and the measure came up short. Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) abruptly announced there would be a 120-second hearing, stopped business on the budget and conducted a confirmation proceeding that took just slightly longer.

Senators approved a Schwarzenegger nominee to the California Transportation Commission whom they had refused to confirm through the normal committee process. Steinberg, with a hint of sarcasm, declared the nominee, Fresno developer and GOP donor Darius Assemi, “eminently qualified.”

Sen. Jeff Denham (R-Atwater) spoke in praise of Assemi and changed his vote. The education bill passed.

Over in the Assembly, meanwhile, lawmakers were annoyed by a demand they said came from the governor. It called for the state to create a “Secretary of Volunteerism,” a paid post. The idea was heavily mocked in side conversations and during floor debates.

“I would like to volunteer to be the Wizard of Adjournment,” Assemblyman Roger Niello (R-Fair Oaks) said after 3:30 a.m., when the legislation finally passed the lower house

Ultimately, the full Legislature approved the post, with some lawmakers expressing worry that the governor might otherwise use his line-item veto authority to retaliate.

“This was the governor’s thing — or else his blue pencil came out,” said Sen. Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills).

Other last-minute side issues included a bid by Republicans to secure a tax break for online travel companies such as Orbitz and Expedia. It didn’t survive. A proposal to help San Diego use more redevelopment funds in a way that could help facilitate construction of a new NFL stadium made it to the governor’s desk.

Special tax breaks for a timber company, cable companies and software firms made it to the governor’s desk too. So did a provision that could help boost the bottom line of an ethanol company founded by former Secretary of State Bill Jones, an ally of and contributor to Schwarzenegger.

Not all of the bickering was partisan. Sen. Leland Yee of San Francisco, a Democrat, refused to vote with most of his caucus on many elements of the budget. He paid a price: Disaster-relief legislation that he wrote for families affected by the San Bruno explosion and fire was killed, and Democrats later moved to Schwarzenegger an identical measure without Yee’s name on it.

Lawmakers sweat the small stuff

The candidates vying to be California’s next governor had their first face-to-face debate Tuesday evening, a polite but contentious exchange in which Republican Meg Whitman and Democrat Jerry Brown largely stuck to their campaign stump scripts, questioning each other’s fitness to lead the state and accusing their opponent of being beholden to campaign contributors.

Whitman repeatedly hammered Brown for his union ties, saying he would be unable to renegotiate pension contracts after labor unions spent millions of dollars propping up his candidacy.

“He will bring people together — it will be a meeting of all of the special interests and the unions who are there collecting IOUs from the campaign they have funded,” she said before 750 audience members in the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts at UC Davis. “I will not owe anything to anyone and I will do what is right for the people of California.”

Brown countered that Whitman has received $25 million from wealthy contributors who would directly benefit from her plan to eliminate the state capital gains tax, which he said would blow a $5-billion hole in the state budget.

“This is a little bit like the kettle calling the pot black,” he said. “That $5 billion comes right out of the general fund…. It’s from schools, from kids, from teachers … to the most powerful and big campaign contributors.”

Brown and Whitman are locked in a tight race, which is remarkable because of Whitman’s record-breaking spending and Democrats‘ double-digit voter registration advantage in California. Interest in their first matchup was intense, with more than 130 journalists covering the event, serving outlets as far away as China, Germany and Japan. A couple hundred protesters milled outside.

The most amusing exchange occurred when a moderator noted that Brown twice ran for president when he was governor previously and asked what would prevent him from doing so again.

“Age,” Brown said. Then he grinned and continued: “Hell, if I was younger, you know I’d be running again.”

But “I now have a wife, I come home at night, I don’t try to close down the bars in Sacramento like I used to do when I was governor of California. I’m going to spend more time in Sacramento and get it done,” he said. “So don’t worry about that; I’m in for the duration here.”

Much of the exchange focused on which candidate is best prepared to fix the state’s flawed government and to spur economic growth and job creation — the billionaire former corporate chief who says her business experience will help right California, or the longtime politician who says his decades in public service mean he alone can bring together the state’s dysfunctional legislators.

Brown said he thought long and hard before deciding to run, and chose to do so because he believes his political experience could help the state weather its current hardships.

“I care a great deal about public service. I think it’s honorable. I’ve lived in this state all my life, I love it, I voted here all my life,” he said. And “God willing,” he added, he would die in California.

Whitman responded that shaking up the status quo takes a new approach.

“My view is if we’re going to change the direction of the state, we have to do it very differently,” she said. “My approach is anchored in focus. I want to do three things really well to restore the faith of the people in California can have in their government.” She said she wanted to cut government spending, create jobs and fix schools.

They also discussed immigration, with Brown favoring a path to citizenship for those in the country illegally and Whitman opposing. And Whitman reiterated her apology for not voting for much of her adult life.

The meeting, sponsored by Capital Public Radio, NBC’s KCRA-TV in Sacramento, the Sacramento Bee and UC Davis, was the first of three debates scheduled before the November election. The next one is Saturday in Fresno.

seema.mehta@latimes.com

Brown, Whitman go head-to-head in first debate

The day after Jesse Kelly won the Republican primary in Arizona’s 8th Congressional District, Democratic incumbent Gabrielle Giffords went on the air with a lacerating attack. Noting that Kelly said he ultimately wanted to eliminate Social Security, Giffords’ television ad warned that Kelly “is a risk we can’t afford.”

Kelly, a construction manager with no political experience, had made the mistake of venturing into the mine-strewn politics of Social Security. No matter that he said he would preserve benefits for current retirees. The fact that he once described it as “the biggest pyramid scheme in history” gave his rival the equivalent of cannon fodder in a district where nearly one-fifth of the population is older than 65.

Kelly is now running his own ad vowing to “honor our commitment to seniors,” trying to fend off a line of assault that Democrats are stepping up throughout the country. It’s one of the few consistent themes in Democratic campaign commercials in a year when the party has otherwise eschewed a national message.

Accusing Republicans of wanting to do away with Social Security is a well-worn trope for Democrats. But a slew of “tea party”-backed candidates who have called for privatizing or eliminating the program have given Democrats fresh ammunition at a time when they are on the defensive about healthcare reform and the economic stimulus.

The strategy allows Democrats to link their rivals to former President George W. Bush, who sought to allow younger workers to invest a portion of their Social Security taxes in the stock market.

“And because it has also become a rallying cry among some of the tea party movement … it’s an indicator of how far to the right and how extreme a position the Republican candidates are taking,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which has devoted the majority of its spots to slamming House GOP candidates on the topic.

Republicans, however, complain that their rivals are distorting their position.

“There have been numerous fact-checks and editorials calling out Democrats for their Social Security attacks,” said Paul Lindsay, spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee. “Democrats are desperately trying to scare seniors.”

“This is what a Democrat says when they’re losing an argument,” said Grover Norquist, president of the conservative Americans for Tax Reform. “If they’re saying this, it means they don’t have anything else to say.”

Nevertheless, Norquist advises GOP candidates to steer clear of Social Security on the campaign trail: “It’s too easy to demagogue.”

Indeed, it’s a testament to the political thorniness of the subject that most Republicans are strenuously avoiding it now that the primaries have passed. While Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) proposed personal retirement accounts for younger workers in his “Roadmap for America’s Future” economic plan this year, the GOP “Pledge to America” released last week does not address how to reform Social Security, whose outlays will regularly exceed its revenue beginning in 2016, the Congressional Budget Office estimates.

But Democrats are still feeding off comments made by their GOP rivals earlier in the year. In Nevada, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid weaves it into nearly every spot he runs against Republican Sharron Angle, who has backed away from earlier statements that she would phase out Social Security. A commercial for Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) includes footage of GOP rival Ken Buck calling Social Security “a horrible policy,” words Buck later said he regretted.

A commercial for Rep. Baron P. Hill (D-Ind.) spotlights a clip of GOP challenger Todd Young calling the program “a Ponzi scheme.” And a new ad by Democratic challenger Tarryl Clark argues that Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) views seniors as addicts, noting that she said she wants to “wean everybody off” Social Security.

“In the past, the Democrats had to strain and work hard to convey the risk of a Republican victory to Social Security,” said Lawrence Jacobs, a political science professor at the University of Minnesota who studies the program. “This year, it’s low-hanging fruit … because there are prominent Republicans running for the Senate and House who have very publicly and clearly raised questions about future of Social Security.”

But in some races, Democrats have taken more generic comments by GOP candidates as evidence of their antipathy to the entitlement. In Wisconsin, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has run three ads asserting that former prosecutor Sean Duffy, the GOP nominee for an open House seat, supports a plan to privatize Social Security. “Sean Duffy may not be worried about his retirement security, but the rest of us are,” stated one, featuring images of the onetime star of MTV’s “The Real World” climbing into a purple SUV.

As evidence, the committee cited Duffy’s endorsement of Ryan’s “Roadmap” plan. But Duffy has never explicitly voiced support for personal accounts, and on his campaign website he states, “I have not and will not endorse privatizing Social Security.” The Democrats’ campaign committee said Duffy was merely trying to backtrack.

It remains to be seen whether the Democratic fusillade will pay off for them at the ballot box. Evan Tracey, president of Campaign Media Analysis Group, a division of Kantar Media that tracks political advertising, said the party was hitting Social Security particularly hard in this cycle because the passage of healthcare reform took away one of their traditional critiques of the GOP.

“The Democratic message is — let’s face it — fear-based and designed to get seniors worried about their Social Security check,” he said. “That’s as common as Republicans calling Democrats liberals. I don’t know if anybody has presented a real argument that’s going to connect with voters.”

matea.gold@latimes.com
Democrats campaign on GOP threats to Social Security

Meg Whitman’s record-breaking spending in the race for governor has enabled her campaign to blanket California with more TV ads and mailers than any other in state history, while also tapping new technologies to further broaden her reach.

With nine weeks left until election day, Whitman has donated $104 million of her own money to the campaign, more than any other candidate in California history and within striking distance of the national record for a non-presidential contest, the $109 million spent by businessman Michael Bloomberg to secure a third term as mayor of New York City.

Those donations have allowed her to target her campaign mailings to the smallest subsets of voters and sort out which television shows are popular among independent voters. (It turns out they are big fans of “Bones,” the crime show rife with romantic tension, on which Whitman has aired ads.)

Dozens of outside consultants and a paid staff the size of some presidential campaigns run an operation that seems to be the living embodiment of Whitman’s book title: “The Power of Many.” After record amounts spent on television advertising, mail and ground organization, there has even been enough money left over to sponsor a youth soccer team.

“She has the money to do everything,” said Garry South, a Democratic consultant who ran Gray Davis‘ campaigns for governor, “and she is doing everything.”

The heart of the race is still to come, yet Whitman’s personal donations already represent more than twice the amount Arnold Schwarzenegger spent in the last gubernatorial election from all sources of money.

Her campaign spent $25 million on television over the summer, more than what Schwarzenegger spent on TV in his yearlong reelection effort. By the beginning of July, she had spent $7.5 million sending mail to voters, almost double Schwarzenegger’s 2006 tally and a figure that does not count the more recent flurry of mail against her November rival, Democrat Jerry Brown.

Overall, she has nearly tripled the previous California record of personal donations to a campaign, set in 1998 by Democratic businessman and gubernatorial candidate Al Checchi.

Still, for all the spending, polls show Whitman and Brown in a competitive race. Although her campaign points to the millions of dollars organized labor is pouring into the contest on Brown’s behalf, that spending pales in comparison to Whitman’s.

Whitman campaign officials say her personal donations were needed to introduce the former EBay chief and first-time candidate to California voters, to whom she was a mystery a year ago.

“We’re doing things much more aggressively than they’ve ever been done before,” said spokesman Tucker Bounds. “The frequency of the activity and the size of the political organization is an enormous investment, but we believe it will pay off on election day.”

In its ability to do more of everything, Whitman’s campaign most resembles that of President Obama, who was able to translate his immense fundraising operation into a deep use of traditional campaign tactics and a broad reach into new ones, including those harnessing the Internet for his political benefit.

Much attention has been drawn to Whitman’s television outlay, but her spending in less-visible political arenas is eye-opening as well.

Through June, Whitman had spent more than $1.2 million on polling and research, dolling out nearly $227,000 to two firms in June alone.

Democratic consultant Darry Sragow said a typical candidate might spend $300,000 on polling in the primary and a like sum in the general election. Whitman’s figures suggest a sharply different strategy than anything seen before.

“They know as much as anybody could know about the mind-set of the California electorate,” he said.

Allan Hoffenblum, a former Republican consultant who runs the Target Book, a nonpartisan compendium of political races, said Whitman was “doing stuff that is on the level of what an incumbent president would be doing running for reelection.”

Whitman’s research contributes to a detailed voter file that identifies voters by their issue interests and then targets them through an aggressive direct-mail program. Whitman’s mail effort, and her simultaneous television barrage, was devastating to her primary election rival, Steve Poizner. His campaign estimates she sent as many as 20 mailers to Republican homes in the last month of the campaign.

Whitman is now unloading on Brown, releasing ads and mail pieces almost weekly. According to the Brown campaign, Whitman’s ads showed up at least 170,000 times in state media markets from the primary through third week of August, even as multiple mailers were arriving at selected voters’ homes.

Whitman demonstrates the power of her money

All hail inexperience — the less familiarity with politics the better, no matter the party or state.

“The support of the voters of Connecticut isn’t bestowed by the establishment or the pundits or the media. It isn’t a birthright,” former World Wrestling Entertainment executive Linda McMahon said after winning the GOP senatorial nomination in her first run for office.

Two mountain ranges away, appointed Sen. Michael Bennett of Colorado, tried to express the same sentiment after dispatching his rival, a former state house speaker. “This election is the first time my name has ever been on the ballot,” said Bennett, who enjoyed President Barrack Obama’s support in the bitter Democratic primary.