CALIFORNIA ELECTIONS U.S. SENATE : Seymour Opens Candidacy by Defining Himself

Republican John Seymour formally opened his campaign for the U.S. Senate on Tuesday by acknowledging that Californians don’t know much about him even though he has served in the Senate by appointment for more than a year.

During a breakfast speech at the Anaheim Marriott Hotel, the 54-year-old Seymour set out to define himself as a caring and loving husband and family man, a businessman who knows the frustration and depression of the unemployed and as a public servant who rose to membership in the U.S. Senate “by a strange twist of fate and circumstances.”

He portrayed himself as an outsider who is appalled by the waste and inefficiency he has found in Washington along with the arrogance of “the good ol’ boys” in Congress who “vote for pay raises for themselves in the middle of the night.”

Thirteen months ago, Seymour was a somewhat-obscure state senator from Orange County when he was picked by his friend, Gov. Pete Wilson, for appointment to the U.S. Senate seat Wilson had just relinquished. Seymour embarked for Washington in 1991 by declaring that he had to “perform and make his mark very quickly” if he was to win the Senate seat on his own in 1992.

But in Anaheim Tuesday morning, Seymour barely mentioned his Senate achievements. He said the question he constantly is asked as he travels about California is not about his Senate record, but: “Who is John Seymour and what does he stand for?”

An unusually somber Seymour talked emotionally about his Anaheim roots, about building his business from scratch and bringing it through tough times, and how he has “cried with pride” over the accomplishments of his six children.

“If somewhere in a footnote, history should record my public service, I would hope that they record me as one who cared more for people than for policy, one who was a no-nonsense guy who worked hard for those in need of help, but who wasn’t hesitant to knock heads of bureaucrats in order to get things done,” Seymour said.

The more familiar feisty, self-confident side of Seymour re-emerged an hour later when he met with shipyard workers in Long Beach and vowed to continue the fight in Washington to save their threatened jobs. Although the jobs would be lost to defense cuts and not to competition from Japan, Seymour used the occasion to lambaste Japanese politicians who have questioned the productivity of American workers.

“They haven’t met the crew from the Long Beach Naval Shipyard yet,” Seymour shouted into a portable public address system, his voice cracking slightly from the strain.

“You guys can kick their butts!” he yelled to the group of about 50 cheering workers assembled for the campaign event.

Seymour had a list of claimed achievements for other stops during a two-day announcement tour: base closings averted in San Diego and the San Francisco Bay Area; ship construction jobs saved in San Diego; help for the Port of Oakland and disaster relief for Central Valley farmers whose crops were destroyed in an Arctic freeze.

Along the way, he endorsed components of President Bush’s economics program, but added a proposed $1,500 tax credit for anyone buying an American-made car.

In Sacramento Tuesday afternoon, Seymour appeared with Wilson, who lauded him at a news conference as a hard-working “advocate for California.”

While Seymour usually speaks extemporaneously or from notes, his morning speech in Anaheim was carefully crafted by Seymour and aides over the past week, a campaign official said. At least one reason for the attempt to define Seymour to voters can be found in opinion polls reporting that nearly half the California public does not know enough about Seymour to assess his work in the Senate.

Those who could rate Seymour in the latest California Poll were about evenly divided as to whether he was doing a good job. In a mythical matchup with Dianne Feinstein, a potential Democratic foe, Seymour trailed by 50% to 38%.

“In my campaign that we’re announcing today, to be elected as your United States senator, I intend to answer all those questions and a lot more,” Seymour said.

Seymour is favored to win the Republican nomination for the two-year Senate term in the June primary over Rep. William Dannemeyer of Fullerton, William Allen of Claremont, a member of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and retired Glendale dentist Jim Trinity. Polls suggest a potentially tough fight for Seymour in the fall against Feinstein or Controller Gray Davis, the other declared candidate for the Democratic nomination.

Also contributing to this story was Times staff writer Doug Shuit in Sacramento.