Schwarzenegger Reiterates Anti-Tax Theme and Will Ask Bush for Help

Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday renewed his pledge not to raise taxes and vowed to work cooperatively with California’s Democratic leaders.

At a 25-minute news conference in Los Angeles, the Republican also reiterated his plans to roll back the state’s vehicle license fee, or car tax -- despite legal disputes over whether he can -- and said he planned to put his lucrative movie career on hold.

“The people of California want me to be their governor, and I will do that and nothing else,” Schwarzenegger said. “There will be no time for movies, or anything else. I will pay full attention to this job.”

The day after ousting Democrat Gray Davis in the first recall vote in California history, Schwarzenegger garnered headlines across the globe and fielded congratulatory phone calls from a who’s who of leaders, from President Bush to former South African President Nelson Mandela.

Even as national Republicans rejoiced at the ascension of one of their own to the governor’s office, Schwarzenegger -- facing an $8-billion budget gap -- said Wednesday he would pressure the president for help.

“He promised me that he will do everything possible to help California, so I’m looking forward to working with him and asking for a lot, a lot of favors,” Schwarzenegger said.

In the news conference, he held off on substantive announcements, not venturing beyond his broad campaign promises.

Schwarzenegger -- who is expected to become California’s 38th governor sometime next month when the election results are certified -- is due to announce members of his transition team today.

He expressed hope that his wife, Maria Shriver, would continue her career as a network television journalist, resuming a role put on hold for the campaign.

A member of the Democratic Kennedy clan, Shriver is also expected to serve as a key advisor in her husband’s administration, reprising the powerful behind-the-scenes role she played in the election.

Davis, meanwhile, spent much of the day after his recall in seclusion with his wife, Sharon, at their West Hollywood condominium. The couple planned to fly to Sacramento on Thursday to thank the governor’s staff. On Wednesday, he did not even return phone calls from campaign aides.

Davis’ recall, by a decisive 55% to 44% vote in unofficial returns, marked just the second time in U.S. history -- and the first time in 82 years -- that a governor has been summarily fired in that fashion.

Schwarzenegger’s win over the second-place replacement candidate, Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, was equally sweeping, 49% to 32%, with Republican state Sen. Tom McClintock coming in third at just over 13%.

Watching from afar, partisans in Washington, D.C., sought to spin the results to their best advantage. Both sides claimed to know what the voter insurrection augured for the 2004 presidential election -- and reached utterly different conclusions.

High Expectations

While most analysts say California is still a strongly Democratic state, the victory by Schwarzenegger could mean the party will have to work a bit harder to hang onto the state’s 55 electoral votes.

But the election of the state’s first Republican governor in 5 1/2 years is not an unalloyed benefit for the GOP, since Schwarzenegger now inherits high expectations and a nagging budget problem.

In Sacramento, where Democrats still control the Legislature and most statewide offices, party leaders warned Schwarzenegger that the easy part -- winning the recall race -- was over.

State Sen. John Burton of San Francisco, now the capital’s most powerful Democrat, said he spoke to Schwarzenegger on Wednesday morning and warned him: “It’s going to be pretty goddamn tough.”

“I’m not sure he knows how complicated and screwed up it is to run a state this size, especially not understanding that there were a lot of cuts made already,” Burton said in an interview. “There’s not a hell of a lot of soup left in the pot to ladle out.”

But after the bitterness of the hard-fought recall race, Wednesday was mostly a day for reconciliation -- or, at the least, conciliatory words.

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat who appeared in ads urging voters to reject the recall, pledged to work with Schwarzenegger and opposed any attempt to recall him in retaliation.

“We have so much work to do to pull this state together, to ease the wounds of what has been a very difficult election and to solve this state’s problems,” Feinstein said at a news conference at her downtown San Francisco office.

She stood by her decision to stay off the recall replacement ballot; given her popularity, her choice left many Democrats muttering what-ifs on Wednesday.

“I didn’t think it was right then. I don’t think it’s right now,” Feinstein said. “I couldn’t say, ‘Vote no on the recall, but vote for me.’ ” As she offered her postmortem, a staffer passed her a note. “Oh!” Feinstein exclaimed. “The new governor’s on the phone.” She ducked out to take the call.

A few hours later, appearing before an army of reporters in Los Angeles, Schwarzenegger spoke in a similarly friendly vein. “I think there is much work we can do together,” he said of the state’s Democratic leaders. “I think we can accomplish a lot together.”

The question-and-answer session was dominated by talk of fiscal affairs, reflecting the most pressing problem that Schwarzenegger will face when he takes office.

Even on Wednesday, Schwarzenegger laid the groundwork for blaming Davis for future budget woes.

“We don’t really know exactly what the current operating deficit is,” he said, offering a figure as high as $20 billion.

That said, he again ruled out tax increases as a way to close the gap. “I campaigned that I would not raise taxes. I say this again,” he told reporters: “I will not raise taxes.”

Rather, Schwarzenegger indicated he would expect help from fellow Republicans in the Bush administration, which was often at odds with Davis.

“They say that for every dollar we pay in tax, we get only 77 cents back,” Schwarzenegger said. “So there’s a lot of money we can get from the federal government and also a lot of other help.”

He promised to release a detailed budget blueprint “in the very near future” after an independent audit of the state’s books, and renewed his vow to repeal the recent tripling of the state vehicle license fee on his first day in office.

There was some uncertainty about whether Schwarzenegger could take that step unilaterally, but the governor-elect said his lawyers had advised that it is possible.

Subtle Threat

Schwarzenegger had said during the campaign that if lawmakers balked at his wishes, he might take some matters directly to the voters. He seemed to make that threat more subtly Wednesday.

“The legislators up there have gotten this message last night, that the people of California want change,” Schwarzenegger said.

Making his first try for public office, the Republican won a thumping victory just months after appearing on movie screens in his signature role as the “Terminator,” a laconic robot from the future.

He captured 50 of California’s 58 counties. He won just about everywhere but in the heavily Democratic San Francisco Bay Area, where Bustamante prevailed.

Significantly, more voters supported Schwarzenegger than backed Davis in the recall, by about 180,000 votes out of roughly 8 million ballots counted so far. The Republican’s strong performance in his political debut thus undercut one of the arguments Democrats were prepared to make in challenging the legitimacy of the recall vote.

Bustamante’s effort to become the first elected Latino governor in modern California history foundered over criticism of his reliance on massive donations from Indian tribes. He had struck a somewhat less than congenial tone as he conceded defeat late Tuesday in his bid to replace Davis.

Noting that Schwarzenegger often filmed movies overseas, Bustamante, who will serve as governor in Schwarzenegger’s absence from the state, encouraged him to continue that practice.

“Go where you like. Feel free to stay as long as you like,” he said with a smirk. “I’ll be here, keeping an eye on things.”

Propositions Fail

Overshadowed by the recall vote were two ballot measures that were defeated Tuesday.

Proposition 53 sought to dedicate up to 3% of state tax funds for infrastructure projects.

Proposition 54 would have stopped the state from collecting and using most racial and ethnic data. Both initiatives lost by the same lopsided vote, with 64% opposed and just 36% in favor.

As for the recall measure, support was both broad and deep. Voters in 43 of California’s 58 counties supported the ouster of Davis, with the core of the governor’s support coming in the left-leaning Bay Area. The recall was also opposed by a bare majority -- 51% -- of voters in Los Angeles County, a traditional Democratic stronghold.

Turnout was a bit lower than the robust figures first reported. Still, election officials were pleased that the voting -- for all the complications involving multiple candidates, a complicated ballot, short timetable and fewer polling places than normal -- came off mostly without a hitch.

“Fears of Florida revisited were not realized,” said Assistant Secretary of State Terri Carbaugh, referring to the cliffhanger count that followed the 2000 presidential race.

Turnout Near 60%

As of Wednesday afternoon, the California secretary of state’s office was reporting that 8.3 million voters, or 53.8% of the total registered statewide, turned out on Tuesday. Absentee ballots and others set aside for review will probably push the total to about 60%.

However, despite the historic nature of the vote and blanket news coverage of the election, turnout was not as high as some had predicted.

The composition of the electorate that turned Davis out of office was not a good deal different from the one that reelected him to a second term less than a year ago.

Interviews with voters as they left the polls showed Tuesday’s electorate was overwhelmingly white -- 72% -- compared with 76% in November. Once more, Republicans turned out in numbers slightly higher than their proportion of registered voters. Latino turnout, at 11%, stayed just about the same, despite the history-making potential of Bustamante’s candidacy.

Source of Strength

Davis drew his greatest strength from two of the Democratic Party’s most loyal constituencies, African Americans and Jews. Nearly eight in 10 black voters opposed the recall, along with nearly seven in 10 Jewish voters.

The allegations of Schwarzenegger’s boorish behavior toward women and charges that he once spoke admiringly of Adolf Hitler also had an impact on the race.

Voters who made up their minds before last weekend, when the reports widely circulated, supported the recall by 57% to 43%, exit polling showed. Those who made up their minds over the weekend or on election day split 50%-50%.

Those who picked a candidate before last weekend backed Schwarzenegger over Bustamante 52% to 30%. Those who decided over the weekend or later picked Schwarzenegger over Bustamante by a narrower 41% to 30%.

Men were also more supportive of Schwarzenegger’s candidacy than women; 52% of men voted for the governor-elect, compared with 44% of women.

In Washington, partisans on both sides seized on the results and spun them to their liking.

“This election was about jobs and the economy,” said House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco. “Among the main arguments used against Gov. Davis was that he inherited record surpluses and turned them into record deficits and presided over a weak economy that has lost jobs. President Bush should take heed of the message.”

Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee, countered that Democrats should note the success of Schwarzenegger’s mostly positive campaign.

“Arnold Schwarzenegger and Republicans understand the future is about solutions and ideas, not blame and attack,” Gillespie said. “The Democrat Party and the Democrat presidential candidates should take heed. The people of California rejected attack politics and a negative message, just as the American people rejected the attack-and-obstruct politics of the Democrat Party in 2002.”

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

‘There Will Be No Time for Movies’

SCHWARZENEGGER’S REMARKS

Excerpts from Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger’s news conference on Wednesday:

‘This is a place that showed me that dreams can become reality. And yesterday, of course, I got from California, from the people of California, the greatest gift of all, which is their trust. And today, I want to thank all of you for that.”

*

‘I will be spending a lot of time in Sacramento, also ... I will be spending a lot of time traveling all over California, because this is a big state.... I think it’s very important that a governor is not just in Sacramento but is all over the state.”

*

‘This morning at 9 o’clock ... I got a call from President Bush

*

‘I campaigned that I would not raise taxes and I say this again, that I will not raise taxes.”

*

‘The people of California want me to be their governor, and I will do that and nothing else. I will work as the governor, I will work as much as I can, even if it is around the clock. There will be no time for movies or anything else.”

*

‘I will make sure that I will provide the jobs that people want. I will bring back the economy, I will bring back the jobs, I will clean up the environment, I will help with education so we improve education -- all of those issues.”

*

‘Well, first of all, as soon as I get into office, I will rescind the car tax.”

*

‘President Bush has assured me that he will do everything possible to help the state of California and to help me achieve my goals. So I will meet with him next week when he comes to California.”

*

‘Well, first of all, the broom was a gesture of like I am going to be up there cleaning house.... I am going to be up there, getting rid of the special interests, the bureaucracy -- that’s why I had the broom in my hand. I think it was a good visual. Don’t you agree?”

*

‘The people of California have voted against the system, and they want change. And that is what I will give them. The legislators got that message last night, that the people of California want change.”

*

Times staff writers Matea Gold, Allison Hoffman, Gregg Jones, Tim Reiterman and Lee Romney contributed to this report.

*

Contributing to coverage of the recall election were Times staff writers Nick Anderson, Eric Bailey, Mark Z. Barabak, Greg Braxton, Michael Finnegan, Sue Fox, Megan Garvey, Matea Gold, Allison Hoffman, Gregg Jones, Daryl Kelley, Scott Martelle, Joe Mathews, Dan Morain, Peter Nicholas, Jennifer Oldham, Jean O. Pasco, Stuart Pfeifer, Jeffrey L. Rabin, James Rainey, Tim Reiterman, Lee Romney, Joel Rubin, Doug Smith, Nancy Vogel, Jenifer Warren and Alan Zarembo.