AD WATCH CAMPAIGN ’92 : Seymour Plans Ads to Sharpen Image

Acknowledging that half of the state’s 13 million registered voters may not know who he is, Republican Sen. John Seymour will attempt to sharpen his public image beginning Monday with the first major television advertising campaign of the 1992 election year in California.

Seymour’s two 30-second spots, previewed for reporters in Los Angeles and Sacramento, will be the first of an onslaught of paid television messages from candidates for President and two U.S. Senate seats.

The first Seymour ad seeks to raise Seymour’s name identification while portraying him as a Washington “outsider,” even though he has served in the Senate for 14 months. Seymour was appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson to fill the two-year vacancy created when Wilson became governor. The commercial does not even identify Seymour as an incumbent senator.

Seymour, who appears full-face on the screen, says: “Congress has botched things up. . . . They think they’ve got all the answers. . . . They don’t care what the real people think. . . . Congress is the epitome of arrogance.”

The legend “The guts to make a difference” flashes on the screen along with the words Remember the Name.

“John Seymour has a very, very low name identification,” Richard McBride, Seymour’s campaign manager, told reporters in Los Angeles. “Who is John Seymour? The first stage of this campaign is to try to define John Seymour and what he stands for.”

Democratic Senate candidate Barbara Boxer briefly aired a television commercial last fall, seeking to capitalize on attention given to issues raised during the Senate’s confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Until now, however, none of the major candidates for the two Senate seats have launched a sustained advertising campaign.

McBride said it is somewhat traditional to begin television ads for a June primary election in March.

“In fact, I’m surprised we’re first,” he said.

A spokesman for the campaign of Rep. William E. Dannemeyer of Fullerton, Seymour’s major opponent in the June 2 Republican primary for the two-year term, said Dannemeyer has no immediate plans for a television ad campaign, in part because the money is not available. Some radio spots will be run beginning in about a month, he said.

John E. Stoos, a spokesman for Dannemeyer, said Seymour “needs to do something to get his name identification up. . . . He has been a sitting U.S. senator for a year and he hasn’t moved in the polls.”

The second Seymour ad will begin airing about one week after the first, McBride said. It seeks to link Seymour, a former Anaheim mayor and state senator, with people’s concerns on the economy.

“There’s a world of hurt out there,” Seymour says, and he pledges to fight to save California’s defense industry and work for long-term economic development.

“We can develop technology to clean our air and purify our water and then take that technology and market it worldwide.

“It’s an idea that’s worth fighting for and I’m gonna fight,” he says.

At the same time, the legend “Fighting for California” appears on the screen.

McBride declined to say how many times the two spots, produced by Craig Stevens of Alexandria, Va., would air, or how much they cost. They will run for some weeks in all major media markets in the state.

“It’s a very substantial buy,” McBride said. “I think it’s safe to say you will turn on your television and not miss John Seymour.”

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