Newport Beach : Nixon to Appear on Herschensohn’s Behalf

Richard M. Nixon will make a rare appearance in the county Tuesday when he speaks at a $1,000-per-person cocktail party for his former presidential speech-writer Bruce Herschensohn, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate.

Some old friends and former staff members of Nixon are planning to attend the reception at developer Donald Bendetti’s home in Big Canyon, Newport Beach, Herschensohn campaign manager Angela Bay Buchanan Jackson said Thursday.

Among those expected to be there: former county GOP chairwoman Lois Lundberg, who worked for Nixon’s campaign in 1968 and 1972, Gavin Herbert who lives in the San Clemente home that was Nixon’s Western White House, and former counsel to the president Richard A. Moore.

Nixon will be making “off-the-cuff” remarks about foreign policy and then answering questions, Jackson said. The former president is expected to spend the night in the county before returning to his home in Saddle River, N.J., the following day.

Nixon was in the county last month for three private events connected with the establishment of a Nixon library in San Clemente, Lundberg said Thursday. But other than that, “he almost never has been here (recently),” she said.

“This is the first time he has done a fund-raiser since the last one he did for me”--an April 21, 1982, dinner to benefit the county Republican Party, Lundberg said.

Lundberg said she had known for about a year that Nixon planned to help Herschensohn in his Senate race. “When I visited with the president in New York last year, he told me he’d do an event for Bruce if (Rep.) Dan Lungren did not remain in the race. Dan has been a long time (Nixon) family friend and Dan’s father was his family doctor,” Lundberg said. However Lungren, saying he could not raise enough money, dropped out of the Senate race in January.

Jackson said that Herschensohn has kept in touch with Nixon regularly about his campaign. Herschensohn was Nixon’s assistant and speech writer from 1972 to 1974 and helped gather support for Nixon in the months before he resigned the presidency in August, 1984.