Elections ’92 : 24TH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT : 2 Lawmakers Set the Stage for a ‘Real Slugfest’

It’s a marquee matchup: one of California’s most prominent, endangered incumbent Democrats versus one of the state’s most outspoken and conservative Republican legislators.

In contrast to this “year of the outsider,” the contest between Rep. Anthony C. Beilenson (D-Los Angeles) and Assemblyman Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks) in the 24th Congressional District looms as a high-profile showdown of two career politicians who offer sharply contrasting personal styles and political ideologies.

McClintock, a take-no-prisoners conservative, won the right to face Beilenson, a low-key moderate-to-liberal, in the newly drawn district by surviving expensive primary challenges Tuesday. McClintock won with 18,153 votes, or 34.6% of the tally.

The anti-tax maverick weathered waves of negative attacks from eight challengers, led by free-spending Calabasas businessman Sang Korman, who finished second with 12,436 votes, or 23.7%. Korman, loser of two previous GOP primaries, poured $370,000 of his own money into the race.

Retired Thousand Oaks airline pilot Bill Spillane made a surprisingly strong third-place showing after investing $300,000 of his savings in the campaign’s final weeks. Spillane took 18.2%. Jim Salomon, a trade consultant also making a third congressional bid, placed a disappointing fourth with 7.4%.

The district, drawn during this year’s reapportionment to extend from Sherman Oaks through the south and west San Fernando Valley to Malibu and up through Westlake Village and Thousand Oaks in Ventura County, is considered Republican-leaning. Beilenson chose to run there to avoid an internecine battle with powerful Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles) when the new congressional map merged both Democrats’ Westside strongholds into a single district.

The race is expected to be one of the most expensive and closely watched in the state.

A Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee official said Wednesday that Beilenson--who sits on the influential House Rules Committee and is a former Intelligence Committee chairman--is one of two vulnerable incumbents who rank as the party’s highest priorities statewide. The other is Rep. George E. Brown Jr. (D-Colton).

“This is one where you know it’s going to be an important race,” DCCC Executive Director Les Francis said. “And it will be a real slugfest.”

McClintock, 35, a five-term lawmaker, said that the GOP has given him similar assurances about targeting the contest. The respective party committees can spend up to $60,240 on behalf of candidates and steer additional “soft money” for party support to the districts.

Beilenson, 59, said he plans to raise about $500,000.

McClintock, who spent about $200,000 in the primary, said he is uncertain about his general-election budget. He vowed to go after Beilenson as a tax-and-spend Democrat who is part of the problem in Washington.

Beilenson, meanwhile, said he will highlight the need to ban special-interest political action committee campaign funding--which he does not accept and McClintock does.

“People are fed up with the fact that they’ve got a government, a Congress, that is not responsive to their needs,” Beilenson said. “A major reason for that lack of responsiveness is that Washington is awash in special-interest money, PAC money.”

McClintock, in turn, said that his goal would be “simply to make this election a referendum on the damage that congressmen like Tony Beilenson have done to our country and to the ability of families to make ends meet.

“He’s consistently voted to plunge the nation into hopeless debt and he’s voted for some of the biggest tax increases in American history. And even that’s not enough: He’s pushing a 52-cent-a-gallon gas tax increase.”

Beilenson has long supported and sponsored legislation to increase taxes to reduce the deficit. In addition, he maintains that a steep gas tax increase phased in over five years would cut foreign energy dependence. But he rejected McClintock’s assertion as false.

“It is not true in any sense of the word that I am part of the deficit problem,” Beilenson said. He added that he had unsuccessfully sponsored a resolution in the Democratic caucus in 1986 calling for a balanced budget within five years, and opposed both the 1981 Reagan-backed tax cut and increased defense spending that he said created the huge deficits.

Arnie Steinberg, a Republican pollster who worked for Korman and is well-acquainted with voters in the 24th District, gives the edge in the fall campaign to McClintock.

“Given the way people feel this year, I think Congressman Beilenson’s very vulnerable to a challenge by McClintock,” Steinberg said. “McClintock more closely fits the district than Beilenson in terms of basically a middle-class, homeowner, anti-tax constituency.”

Even as the two nominees looked ahead, one battle-scarred combatant bade farewell to the political arena--at least for now.

Korean-American immigrant Korman, who has pumped nearly $1 million of his money into his three failed races, said he’s got to return to his business.

“I did everything possible, and I had a lot of supporters,” said Korman, who reported logging more than 1,500 miles in his door-to-door stumping. “I’m so proud of them and I say thanks to them. It was God’s choice. I cannot go against God.”

PRIMARY RESULTS

Absentee ballots hold key to Hayden’s lead. A3

Roberti revels in hard-fought victory over Rowen. A24

Other election coverage can be found on A1, A3, A16-A24, B1 and B9

A listing of vote totals can be found on A19-A20