Governor Picks Press Secretary to Head Drive for Reelection

Gov. George Deukmejian, who has yet to announce officially that he will run for reelection to a second term, Monday named press secretary Larry Thomas as his campaign director.

Thomas, who will manage the day-to-day operations of Deukmejian’s expected campaign, began a leave of absence from his state post to assume his new task.

The 38-year-old spokesman for the governor has never previously managed a political campaign. In 1978, he served as communications director in the unsuccessful gubernatorial campaign of then-San Diego Mayor Pete Wilson.

Thomas said he will report to the governor but will also be responsible to a policy formation group that includes Steven A. Merksamer, the governor’s chief of staff; adviser Kenneth Khachigian; finance chairman Karl M. Samuelian; treasurer Pat Fornby; pollster Lance Tarrance of Houston, and media director Roger Ailes of New York.

Thomas said he expects the governor to formally announce his candidacy sometime before the filing deadline of March 7.

“I’m going to organize the campaign office (in Sacramento) and presumably direct the day-to-day operations,” Thomas said.

Assuming that Deukmejian wins reelection, Thomas said he expects to return as press secretary, the job he took in January, 1983, when Deukmejian was sworn in as governor.

Thomas, a former reporter, was then-Mayor Wilson’s press secretary in San Diego from 1971 to 1977. From 1978 until 1983, he managed international media relations for the Bechtel Group Inc. in San Francisco.