50TH ASSEMBLY DISTRICT : Tucker Aims for Political Knockout

When Inglewood Councilman Daniel Tabor declared in March that he would challenge veteran Assemblyman Curtis Tucker (D-Inglewood) in the Democratic primary, he was seen as the first serious threat to the incumbent since Tucker went to the Assembly in 1974.

Tabor, 33, a two-term councilman with a talent for public speaking and a reputation as a rising star in black politics, planned to field an aggressive grass-roots campaign.

Tucker, 70, has risen to the challenge, amassing a huge war chest and flooding the 50th Assembly District with campaign workers, signs and literature.

Campaign Woes

Meanwhile, Tabor’s campaign has been afflicted with financial and organizational problems. As the Tuesday primary approaches, the councilman and his young campaign staff are talking less about victory and more about a respectable showing.

Others in Inglewood political circles say that if Tucker beats the two-term councilman by a wide margin, Tabor could be vulnerable in council elections next April.

Predicting victory, Tucker said: “I believe I’ll beat him in his own (council) district.”

Tabor still rejects the idea that he committed “political suicide,” as Tucker put it, by challenging the area’s political patriarch.

“We haven’t heard anything from the voters signaling the death of Danny Tabor,” Tabor said. “We’re hearing positive things from people we talk to in the district.”

Tabor said supporters have told him that even if he loses “at worst I’ll have made a statement, fought a hard race and increased my name recognition.”

Fund-Raising Clout

Tucker--a seven-term legislator, chairman for five years of the Assembly Health Committee and key ally of Assembly Speaker Willie Brown--has demonstrated his fund-raising clout, raising $224,855 this year, as of the last campaign reports filed May 21.

Tabor, by contrast, had raised $18,086.

Tucker has inundated households with more than a half-dozen slick campaign mailers and has spread bright orange campaign signs across the district, which encompasses El Segundo, Westchester, Inglewood, Lennox and parts of South Los Angeles. The district population is about 55% black, 20% Latino and heavily Democratic. The winner of Tuesday’s primary will face Republican Michael Davis of Inglewood in November.

Tucker’s endorsement list includes a pantheon of top state Democrats, including Sen. Alan Cranston, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley and Los Angeles County Supervisor Kenneth Hahn. Tabor has been endorsed by local chapters of the National Organization for Women and the Mexican-American Political Assn.

Tucker political consultant Parke Skelton said that his telephone surveys show that Tucker holds a commanding lead and that there is a slightly higher percentage of undecided voters in Westchester and El Segundo than elsewhere in the district.

Tabor’s plans for an aggressive grass-roots effort have been hampered from the outset. His first campaign manager resigned in April after deciding he could not devote sufficient time to the campaign, slowing and disorganizing the effort in the crucial opening weeks.

The funding picture has been bleak: Tabor said Tuesday that he only recently has raised enough money to put out a campaign mailer, which will be distributed this weekend.

Tabor said his bid has suffered because potential contributors did not want to offend Tucker and his powerful allies in Sacramento. In addition, the black community’s focus on the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s presidential campaign has consumed funds and volunteers, Tabor said.

Tabor campaign manager Chris Robert acknowledged last week that the campaign has had trouble getting out its message. In the final days, Tabor’s campaign will concentrate on Inglewood in hopes of splitting that city’s vote, Robert said.

Foolish Challenge

Some state and local political leaders had warned Tabor that it would be foolish to challenge Tucker. But Tabor forged ahead, charging that the assemblyman was not providing leadership. At the same time, some said, Tabor was moving to establish himself as Tucker’s heir apparent.

Tucker has scored reelection margins of 80% in past years against little-known opponents. Tabor allies and observers say the councilman needs to score at least 30% of the vote in order for his candidacy to have strengthened him for future campaigns.

An Inglewood political activist who knows both Tucker and Tabor said: “All things considered, if Danny gets 30%, that becomes a building block for the future.”

That prospect has not been lost on the Tucker forces, said the activist, who asked to remain anonymous. “They’re not just running to win. They’re running to kick his butt.”

If Tabor loses overwhelmingly, he may have to ward off multiple challengers in next April’s council election. Tucker’s son, Curtis Tucker Jr., has said that he plans to run for Tabor’s council seat with his father’s backing.

‘They Know His Ambitions’

“I know of several other people who are planning to run against him,” said the elder Tucker. “Too many people know Danny now. They know his ambitions.”

Tucker accused Tabor of neglecting his east Inglewood district, where Tucker lives and served as councilman before going to the Assembly. Tucker and Tabor have feuded since 1985, when Tucker accused the councilman of opposing him on local issues and backed an unsuccessful candidate against Tabor.

Tucker, a retired Army medic and county health inspector, has an alternately jovial and tough-talking manner and a passion for his family, poker and the cuisine of his native Louisiana. Tucker and his family braved racial harassment when they were among the first blacks to move into previously all-white Inglewood in 1962. He and his wife, Lorraine, have five children and two grandchildren.

After serving from 1972 to 1974 as Inglewood’s first black councilman, he dispatched a crowded field of primary opponents vying for the new 50th Assembly District seat created by reapportionment. He has built a reputation as a classic old-school politician who concentrates on the nuts and bolts of attending to his constituents.

“I’m one of the few legislators who goes home every weekend,” Tucker said. “People want you to answer their phone calls, people want to hear you and see you.”

Help With Project

Inglewood dentist Frank Lewis said Tucker helped him and other dentists promote an effort to increase public funds for dental care for the needy several years ago, though Lewis said the group eventually abandoned the project.

“I don’t know of anyone who’s gone to Curtis for help and been turned away,” said Lewis, who knows both candidates. “There’s no question about his popularity. . . . Danny’s a very bright young man with a bright political future, but I don’t see any positive benefits in this.”

Former El Segundo Mayor Jack Siadek predicted that Tucker will win in the mostly white, Republican city. He said Tucker has been attentive to the city’s needs.

“I’m a Republican, but I hope Tucker makes it,” Siadek said. “If people here vote for a Democrat, they’ll vote for Tucker.”

Tucker says his most notable legislative achievement has been passage of “agency shop” legislation requiring public employees to pay union dues if they work in a union-represented workplace, a major organized labor cause that helped to cement his strong union support.

Supported Death Penalty

He also wrote legislation that brings $1 million a year to Inglewood from a tax on Hollywood Park race track and voted in favor of the law that reinstated the state death penalty.

Tucker’s role as a Brown lieutenant and committee head has proved to be lucrative. Health industry political action committees dominate his campaign contribution list: The California Medical PAC has given his campaign fund $34,500 this year. Last year, he received more than $11,000 in gifts and speaker fees.

Tucker’s unabashed acceptance of lobbyists’ generosity has occasionally drawn criticism, as in 1984, when Tucker and members of his family accepted free eye care and political contributions from competing eye-care lobbies in a fight over legislation.

Tabor has charged that Tucker is beholden to powerful lobbies rather than to his constituents.

In response to such criticism, Tucker quotes a former Assembly speaker and state treasurer: “Jesse Unruh once said to me: ‘Take their money. Eat their food. Drink their booze. And then, vote no. If you can’t do that, you don’t belong in Sacramento.’ You don’t sell a vote.”

Generational Struggle

Two generations separate Tucker from Tabor, whose smooth style has earned him a reputation as a rising political star. Tabor says his Assembly candidacy is part of a generational struggle in black politics between progressive young leaders and complacent incumbents.

Tabor says Tucker’s campaign image as a legislator who fights for his constituents is contradicted by such district problems as the closure of hospital trauma centers, high crime and costly auto insurance rates. One of Tabor’s frequent targets is legislation sponsored by Tucker that made the threatening use of a replica handgun a crime.

“Nobody’s ever been shot by a replica handgun,” Tabor said. “What about all the young men and women being shot down every day with real guns?”

Tucker said the gun lobby has stymied gun control legislation. He also said he had repeatedly sought increased funding to reopen trauma centers, only to have it blocked by gubernatorial vetoes.

As councilman, Tabor has emphasized affirmative action in hiring and contract opportunities for black entrepreneurs, pursuing that issue in protests with black organizations against CBS television and developer Alexander Haagen’s Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza shopping center project last year.

‘Grandstand Plays’

Tucker calls such efforts “grandstand plays” devoid of substance.

Tabor, who works full time directing a volunteer project for the United Way in South Los Angeles, emphasizes involving constituents in the political process and using the buying power of the black community as a weapon for “economic civil rights.”

For example, while Tucker has fought high auto insurance rates by sponsoring legislation that would base rates exclusively on driving records, Tabor proposes organizing constituents to press for lower rates by warning selected insurance companies that they will withhold their business.

Because a heavy black turnout for Jesse Jackson is expected on primary day, both candidates have tried to “out-Jackson” each other in claiming support for the Chicago minister.

Tabor ran as a Jackson delegate in the 1984 presidential primary while Tucker supported Walter Mondale, but Tucker stung Tabor early on the Jackson issue. A Tucker mailer reprinted a 1986 letter Tabor wrote in a local newspaper criticizing Jackson for allegedly ignoring negotiations by local black groups when Jackson declared a nationwide boycott of CBS television over minority hiring.

‘Johnny-Come-Lately’

Tabor responded that he had simply disagreed with Jackson on a specific issue and accused Tucker, the local congressional district chairman of Jackson’s California campaign, of being a “Johnny-come-lately” to the Jackson campaign.

Tucker also criticized Tabor’s acknowledged close relationship with the owners of Joshua’s, an Inglewood nightspot hit by city and state legal action after nuisance problems there angered residents of Tabor’s district.

A fictitious business name statement filed with the Los Angeles County Clerk shows that Tabor and an owner of the club formed a business partnership in 1986. Tabor subsequently lobbied for the club and took part in council actions concerning the club.

City Atty. Howard Rosten concluded that there had not been a conflict of interest for Tabor, who said the proposed business venture never developed and was unrelated to the club. Tucker said the connection looks bad, nonetheless.

Tucker also questioned Tabor’s campaign biography, which claimed that Tabor had earned a bachelor’s degree from California State University, Long Beach, in personnel development and labor relations. Tabor added a sentence to the biography acknowledging that he is three units short of his diploma.