E-mail slip-up another twist in budget standoff

Whoops. An attempt by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s staff to show grass-roots GOP support for his call for a quick passage of the state budget backfired this week when an administration e-mail chain was inadvertently shared with the media.

The e-mails revealed that a statement backing the governor released under the name of a Republican Party committee member was, for the most part, drafted not by the committee member but by the governor’s office.

Some things the statement said about the Republican lawmakers who have been blocking the budget’s passage for more than a month were not so nice.

“The Senate Republicans need to take a page from President Reagan’s playbook and learn how to look like they’re winning even when things might not be going their way,” said the statement signed by Noel Knight, a member of the state GOP platform committee. “They need to remember it’s always better to bend than to break.”

The statement went on to praise the Republican governor’s leadership and his promises to GOP lawmakers that he would use his line-item veto to cut hundreds of millions of dollars in spending from the budget that they find objectionable.

“So yes, kick, scream, and drag your heels, but in the end, compromise on a budget because California needs one and because it’s the right thing to do,” the statement said.

Knight sent the statement to the media. But he mistakenly attached a copy of his correspondence with the governor’s associate deputy director of communications, which shows she wrote almost the whole thing.

By Friday evening, administration officials were backpedaling. Sort of.

“This was an overzealous employee sending an e-mail that should not have been sent,” said Schwarzenegger communications director Adam Mendelsohn. “These suggested talking points were not cleared by the administration and they do not reflect the administration’s position.... But that doesn’t change the fact that the budget should be done and people are frustrated that it isn’t.”

The episode isn’t helping relations between the governor and Republicans, which are at their lowest point since Schwarzenegger took office.

That relationship was already on track to get worse next week, when the governor is expected to continue publicly criticizing the GOP holdouts.

Matt Ross, communications director for the Senate Republican caucus, said of the Knight statement: “We are disappointed that anyone in the governor’s office would take such action.”

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evan.halper@latimes.com