Rohrabacher Foe Challenges Mailer : Politics: Buffa files complaint over fellow Republican’s implication that he represents new 45th District.

In an election year when check writing at the House bank has caused members of Congress great embarrassment, even the franking privileges can raise questions, as Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) has learned.

But Rohrabacher makes no apologies for implying in a recent election campaign mailer that he already represents the new 45th Congressional District, where he is one of three Republican candidates. Nor did he refrain earlier this year from mailing newsletters at taxpayers’ expense to voters in the new district.

“The practice is totally legal,” he said Thursday.

Rohrabacher added that he has voted in the past to restrict congressmen from using their free mailing privilege to communicate with voters in new districts and has also supported reductions in the allotment for mailing newsletters to constituents.

“Frankly, I voted to restrict it, but didn’t feel I had to unilaterally refrain from doing this,” he said.

The new 45th Congressional District was created earlier this year under reapportionment. It includes Huntington Beach and Newport Beach. Rohrabacher is being challenged for the seat in the June 2 primary by Costa Mesa Councilman Peter F. Buffa and Huntington Beach Councilman Peter M. Green.

Staff members for the three other Orange County congressmen seeking election to new districts this year said they have purposely avoided using franking privileges to mail campaign literature outside their current districts. Those congressmen are Reps. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove), Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach), and Ron Packard (R-Oceanside).

Dave Ellis, a political consultant for Packard, said the issue is particularly sensitive this year, “because people are frustrated, fed up and pessimistic. It’s one of those symbolism issues that may not be huge in the giant scheme of things, but because it’s a giant example of wasted tax dollars, people are more concerned and more angry about it.”

If any recent mailings “spilled over” into sections of the new district, it was not intentional, said Dornan aide Brian Keeter.

“Congressman Dornan believes it is a loophole that needs to be closed,” he added.

A spokesman for Cox offered a similar opinion.

In an attempt to capitalize on the issue, Buffa this week filed a complaint against Rohrabacher with the Federal Elections Commission.

Buffa cited a campaign letter mailed by Rohrabacher on stationery that lists the congressman’s name, followed on the next line by “Forty-Fifth District.”

“The incumbent in the (current) 45th Congressional District is Rep. Duncan Hunter down in San Diego,” Buffa said in a recent interview, “and for Dana to send out letters referring to himself as a member of Congress from the 45th District is clearly a deception.”

Mark Davis, an attorney for the House Ethics Committee, said there is no rule that prevents a congressman from implying that he already represents the district he is campaigning for.

And concerning mail from the congressional office, a member “can send official mail to . . . areas that were added to the current district,” Davis said.

Rohrabacher called Buffa’s charges “political nit-picking,” but said he was not surprised by the move.

“Obviously, he’s going to focus on trivia if he can, because he does not want to focus on the major issues,” Rohrabacher said.

The stationery using the “45th District” letterhead, he added, has not gone out “to anyone who would not know the difference.”

On his use of the franking privilege, Rohrabacher said he expected to receive some criticism, “but I knew that if I did not spend this allotment this way, that it would go into a slush fund that is controlled by the Speaker of the House, who is a liberal Democrat.”