Tribes’ Election Support Sought

Gov. Gray Davis on Thursday offered Indian tribes a key role in picking members of the state commission that regulates tribal gambling, as he and two of the candidates to replace him sought support from Native Americans in the recall election.

It was a testament to the tribes’ growing political clout in the state that Davis, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante and state Sen. Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks) each trooped to a downtown Sacramento hotel Thursday to be quizzed at the monthly meeting of the California Nations Indian Gaming Assn.

As they did so, Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger made his first campaign foray outside of coastal Southern California, appearing at a series of Central Valley events designed as politically safe photo opportunities -- with children, workers at an agricultural processing plant and shoppers at a mall.

But Schwarzenegger and his aides spent part of the day responding to questions about a sexually graphic interview he gave to a men’s magazine in 1977. In the interview, he talked of using marijuana and hashish and described an incident in which he and several other body builders had group sex with a woman at a gym in Venice.

Bustamante also faced questions about his past, with McClintock saying the lieutenant governor should denounce a Mexican American student organization he belonged to in the 1970s that once called for creation of a separate Chicano homeland.

With just under six weeks left until the Oct. 7 election, it was the first time Davis and the prominent recall candidates had campaign events scheduled on the same day. And with a Thursday deadline for filing detailed fund-raising and expenditure reports, it was the busiest campaign day since the ballot was set earlier this month.

Davis used his 20-minute pitch before the tribal gaming association to repair a strained relationship. In what has become a theme of his struggle to save his job, the Democratic governor mixed words of contrition for past mistakes with a strong defense of his record, according to several people in the audience.

Davis offered to give tribes that have casinos the lead role in selecting two of the five members on the California Gambling Control Commission. Tribal leaders said that the offer was unprecedented but that it was justified, given their status as sovereign nations and their expertise in gambling issues.

“There are no better experts in Indian gaming than Indian tribes,” said Jacob Coin, executive director of the tribal association.

Davis told the tribal leaders that he had done more for Native Americans than any governor in California history, according to people at the meeting. And he conceded that he erred in January by submitting a budget that called for collecting $1.5 billion in taxes from tribes without first consulting with them.

The governor said later that he would like to encourage some tribes to “share some of their resources with the state.”

“That’s a provision that’s been adopted in other states around the country,” Davis said, but he added: “This is a two-way street. No one has a gun to anyone’s head and both sides would have to agree to it.”

McClintock and Bustamante went further than Davis in some respects, endorsing the idea of lifting a cap on the number of slot machines tribes can operate -- a restriction contained in 1999 Indian gambling agreements negotiated by Davis and approved overwhelmingly by the Legislature and California voters.

Bustamante, the only prominent Democrat on the ballot to replace Davis, indirectly criticized the governor’s efforts to increase the state share of Indian casino revenue.

“Just at the moment when they’re starting to realize economic benefit -- and not all of them have yet ... the rules begin to change around a little bit,” Bustamante said .

“There seems to be two sets of rules. I think they are very concerned about that. I think they just want to be treated like everybody else.”

McClintock has made similar statements in recent days, opposing the idea of tribes being asked to share more of their income with the state.

Native American leaders said McClintock impressed them with his impassioned defense of tribal sovereignty and with pledges that he would not pressure tribes to negotiate union contracts with workers or make agreements with local governments to ease the impact of Indian casinos.

Neither Davis, Bustamante nor McClintock made a direct appeal to the tribes for campaign contributions. But some tribal leaders said they would donate money to one or more candidates.

By contrast, Schwarzenegger has not sought to gain support from them. Indeed, several Native American leaders angrily noted that he had referred to the tribes as a “special interest” on a par with labor unions and other groups. They said that characterization fails to recognize tribes’ constitutionally guaranteed status as sovereign nations.

Elsewhere in the campaign Thursday, Peter V. Ueberroth, former commissioner of Major League Baseball, held a town hall meeting in San Diego where he said he would pursue a balanced budget like “a mad dog after a meat truck.”

And Green Party standard bearer Peter Camejo proposed raising taxes on the richest Californians and using the money to invest in alternative energy.

The biggest crowds of the day, however, surrounded Schwarzenegger.

Central Valley residents crashed his appearance at a Fresno charter school and mobbed a rally in front of a movie theater complex at the Shops at River Park. The actor picked up an endorsement from Fresno’s Republican mayor, Allan Autry, and trumpeted a new and potentially important endorsement from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn.

The first question reporters asked, however, was about the 1977 interview, which appeared in Oui magazine. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Schwarzenegger said. “I’m here to push my economic agenda.”

Wednesday night, when he was asked about the interview on a radio talk show, Schwarzenegger acknowledged being “outrageous” in his youth.

“I never lived my life to be the governor of California,” he said. “Obviously, I’ve made statements that are ludicrous and crazy and outrageous, and that’s the way I always was. I was always outrageous; otherwise I wouldn’t have done the things I’ve done in my career.”

Schwarzenegger’s visit to Fresno provided few new specific proposals. He instead relied on two stump speeches that have become campaign mainstays: a paean to education spending and after-school programs for audiences of children, and anti-tax red meat for groups of small-business owners.

His stop at Edison-Bethune Charter Academy, a state-supported elementary school with some of the lowest test scores in California, may have inadvertently called attention to the school’s academic failings and its parent company’s financial troubles.

But campaign officials said the visit was intended for Schwarzenegger to learn more about charter schools.

The candidate encouraged students to work hard and do their homework, but added no specifics to his education policies. “Now, of course, I’m running for governor of this state. Talk about homework!” he said.

Schwarzenegger got the most enthusiastic response from a throng of about 3,000 people at the River Park mall.

Paid signature gathers from a company called American Petitions mingled with the crowd, signing up hundreds of people to vote. It was the first public sign of the aggressive voter registration Schwarzenegger aides have promised.

The audience was largely male and young. But Beriah Schmidt, 54, a soil scientist for the federal government, said Schwarzenegger made him feel young.

“You know what I like about this guy is that nobody ever gave him a damn thing,” Schmidt said. “I haven’t voted in the last few elections, but I’m going to register again to vote for him.”

Bustamante, for his part, focused his day on an announcement about controlling gasoline prices, which have climbed to well over $2 a gallon this summer. But he also faced questions about his past.

As a student activist at Fresno State University in the 1970s, Bustamante was a member of MEChA, the Chicano Student Movement of Aztlan, which, among other things, had called for the formation of a Chicano nation.

As a fill-in host on San Diego radio station KOGO-AM (600), McClintock called on Bustamante to renounce his membership in the group.

“MEChA is a radical and racist organization,” McClintock said, adding that membership is like saying “you’re a member of the Klan.”

Addressing reporters in Sacramento, Bustamante said the group was in the mainstream at Fresno State when he participated and that he joined a coalition slate in a failed run for student body president.

A Fresno State instructor from that era, Theresa Perez, said the group focused on farm workers’ rights and other issues and that the idea of taking back parts of the United States once home to native Aztecs was a symbolic idea.

“I think the actuality of what takes place in those organizations is to provide student leadership,” Bustamante said. “That’s how I got here today, by getting involved.”

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Times staff writers Jessica Garrison, Dan Morain, Alan Zarembo, Daryl Kelley, Scott Martelle, Michael Finnegan and Jose Cardenas contributed to this report.