Rep. Dymally Says Decision on Reelection Is Imminent : Politics: He plans to make up his mind this weekend. A news conference has been scheduled for Monday.

Amid speculation that he may soon announce his retirement, Rep. Mervyn M. Dymally (D-Compton) said Thursday that he will decide this weekend whether to seek a seventh term.

“Those rumors are speculative, and I have not made up my mind yet,” said Dymally, who has scheduled a breakfast and news conference Monday morning at the Compton Ramada Hotel.

Invitations to the event say it will honor Dymally’s daughter, Lynn Dymally-Lee, a Compton school trustee, heightening yet more speculation that she may launch her own bid for the congressional seat after her father bows out.

“I have no influence over Lynn,” the congressman said Thursday, adding that the decision on seeking reelection is a very personal one that he has not even discussed with his staff.

There has been intense speculation that Dymally will not run for reelection this year, which would bring an end to a 30-year political career that began with his election to the state Assembly in 1962.

Dymally, who will be 65 in May, represents the 31st Congressional District, which stretches from Lynwood, Hawthorne and Paramount south through Compton, Carson and Gardena. This year he was expected to run in the newly drawn 37th District, which includes Lynwood, Compton, Carson and the Wilmington area of Los Angeles.

With the talk about Dymally’s possible retirement, a host of Democrats are already being mentioned as potential successors.

Assemblyman Willard H. Murray Jr. (D-Paramount) said he will definitely enter the race if Dymally retires. Murray once worked for Dymally as an aide, but since then the two have become bitter foes.

Compton Mayor Walter R. Tucker III said he is running even if Dymally seeks reelection. Others said to be considering a congressional bid include former Compton Mayor Doris Davis and Assembly members Marguerite Archie-Hudson and Gwen Moore, both Los Angeles Democrats.

After serving nearly 13 years in the Assembly and state Senate, Dymally was elected lieutenant governor in 1975, the only black to hold that post. He was defeated in a bid for reelection in 1979 but was elected to Congress the following year.