Their Armor Dented, Can Baker, Wieder Repair the Damage?

The damage has been done. The Republican front-runners in the 40th and 42nd congressional districts have been accused, in the one case, of adultery, and in the other, of fabricating a college degree.

Can they recover?

Irvine City Councilman C. David Baker, who hopes to succeed Rep. Robert E. Badham (R-Newport Beach) in the 40th District, has not responded directly to the allegations that he engaged in an adulterous affair. He said that he and his wife of 13 years had been “through some tough times” but now are “more committed to each other than ever.”

Orange County Board of Supervisors Chairman Harriett M. Wieder, running for the 42nd District seat being vacated by Rep. Daniel E. Lungren (R-Long Beach), said she had not corrected the mistaken college degree incorporated by someone else into her biography 25 years ago because “it looked good and it was wishful thinking.” She said she perpetuated the error because she felt “ashamed” of not going to college.

Both are asking voters to judge them on their records. But, in the wake of the accusations against Baker and Wieder, matters of personal integrity now overshadow other issues in the two heavily Republican congressional districts.

Whether it is at the local level or in presidential politics, campaign disclosures can sink a campaign or merely damage it, depending to some extent on how they are handled. The Democratic presidential campaigns of Gary Hart and Joseph Biden were mortally wounded by disclosures that Hart had had an affair with a Miami model and that Biden had plagiarized a campaign speech and exaggerated his academic record.

But Democrat Michael S. Dukakis survived potential voter backlash against his campaign for having disclosed Biden’s plagiarism--admittedly not as serious an indiscretion as Biden’s----by immediately apologizing for the tactic and firing his campaign manager.

As a local legislative aide said, the Hart and Biden incidents have sensitized voters to character issues in campaigns at all levels.

“As Baker is to Hart, Wieder is to Biden,” the aide said.

Carlos Rodriguez, a Sacramento-based political consultant who is engineering C. Christopher Cox’s campaign in the 40th District, said a candidate’s stand on issues such as the budget deficit or regional transportation may not be as important as the candidate’s integrity and forthrightness with voters.

“It’s easy to forget that voters elect people to office; they don’t elect position papers,” Rodriguez said.

Political observers say Wieder is neutralizing the damage--or, more specifically, the amount of publicity generated following the accusation--by directly addressing the issue. Her opponents will most likely try to keep the issue alive in campaign mail, but the issue should die down well before the June 7 primary.

Baker’s problem is more difficult. He is in more of a damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t position regarding any response he could make to the accusation.

The long-simmering rumor about Baker allegedly engaging in an adulterous affair with an Irvine woman surfaced when an unidentified man confronted him at a candidates’ forum in Newport Beach. There is widespread speculation that the man, who fled following the confrontation, was set up by one of the other candidates. But so far there is no proof of that.

Voters’ Judgment

Much depends on whether voters believe the accusation or, more important, whether they believe that it raises issues of character and judgment.

Orange County pollster and UC Irvine professor of social ecology Mark Baldassare said that it is hard to tell just how Baker will be affected because the issue “hasn’t been played out.”

“It is a pretty sophisticated group of people we’re talking about in the district,” he said, speaking of voters in the 40th District, which includes Newport Beach, Irvine, Fountain Valley and Laguna Beach, among other Orange County communities. “So I don’t think they’ll be fundamentally judgmental. I think they’ll wait and see what other information, if any, comes out on it.”

Many political observers believe that if the allegations are true, Baker would do well to fully disclose them. By not directly responding to the adultery charges, the issue could well “haunt” Baker the balance of the campaign, a consultant to one candidate in the 40th District race said.

“Whenever he knocks on a door, steps before a crowd or enters a candidates’ forum, there will be this fear that somebody, and it could be anybody, will raise the question,” the source said. Of Baker, he said, “I’m sure there will be some sleepless nights.”

Others said Baker might have done well to deal with the accusation openly from the outset, since the adultery issue was widely rumored in Irvine even before he entered the race. Fueling the rumor throughout the district was an anonymous letter sent to the media and other candidates accusing Baker of an extramarital affair.

One candidate, because of the rumors, polled voters on the issue of adultery and found that 73% of the respondents would be “less likely” to vote for a candidate who was having an adulterous affair. But this candidate’s dilemma was that 65% of those respondents said they would be “less likely” to vote for the candidate who exposed such an affair.

Instead of confronting the issue publicly, Baker gave assurances privately to potential supporters that his marriage was intact. The issue was not discussed openly until after the “political streaker”--as one observer nicknamed the unidentified man--made the accusation at the candidates’ forum.

“I’ve had candidates who drink or who have had financial problems, and I try to turn those negatives around and show that my guy is human, just like the voter,” one political consultant said. He said Baker’s strategy “set him up for a very, very hard fall.”

Baker’s political consultant, Frank Caterinicchio, when asked why Baker did not try to neutralize the rumors about the alleged affair in the campaign’s early days, said, “How can you respond to rumor?” He added that there were only allegations. “There is no proof,” he said.

Stuart Mollrich, a Newport Beach consultant also advising Baker, said many of Baker’s backers have called to renew their support for the one-term councilman, who received key endorsements from Badham and state Sen. Marion Bergeson (R-Newport Beach).

Said Mollrich: “There has been no erosion of Dave’s support.”

Since the allegation was raised, Baker has not modified his campaign, appearing as scheduled at fund-raising and get-out-the-vote events.

“The best way to face this kind of smear is not to duck appearances,” Mollrich said.

As for Wieder, another political consultant predicted that she would “be fine” because, once confronted, she immediately admitted to the error on her biography.

“The Wieder story is probably dead,” John Whitehurst, former executive director of the Orange County Democratic Foundation and Democratic Associates and now a senior political consultant with Clinton Reilly Campaigns in San Francisco. “You guys (the media) are going to stop writing about it.”

As another legislative aide commented, “If Harriett had said, ‘I have no comment,’ think of your response. The story keeps living.” He added that, in Baker’s case, “This story will keep living because Dave Baker has not addressed it in a straightforward way.”

Whitehurst said he tells candidates who have a scandal or a crisis to “come clean fast” because “so many people are looking at you, everybody will know the truth eventually.”

“The worst thing people can think about you is that you’re a liar,” Whitehurst said. He said that once the truth is out, “the public will then either accept or reject you. But you’re guaranteed to lose if you do the shuffle.”

Political consultant Joe Cerrell said the wisest thing to do is “throw yourself at the mercy of the people” and try not to talk about it so you do not tell people who do not already know.

And, Cerrell added, “the final thing on damage control is you pray a lot, just pray it’s going to go away.”