Reprisal for Anti-Clinton Tactics Feared : Politics: Congressmen who urged Bush to attack candidate’s patriotism may be threatening San Diego’s chances and their own.

Two San Diego congressmen’s central role in President Bush’s attack on Democratic rival Bill Clinton’s patriotism, a gambit that has dominated the presidential race for the last week, has begun to show signs of becoming a major issue in their own reelection bids.

By having helped to orchestrate an attack that Clinton has characterized as reminiscent of McCarthyism, Republican Reps. Duncan Hunter and Randy (Duke) Cunningham may have “climbed out on a limb and sawed it off,” potentially damaging their own clout and that of their districts if Clinton becomes President, said Hunter’s opponent, Janet Gastil.

“I’m getting calls and contributions from people outraged over this,” added Bea Herbert, Cunningham’s opponent. “One man called and said: ‘Are you the one running against that cockroach? How can I help you?’ ”

Although such criticism from the congressmen’s opponents and Democrats in general is hardly surprising, even some local Republicans have faulted Cunningham and Hunter for exceeding what they view as the acceptable bounds of partisan debate by injecting questions about Clinton’s patriotism into the presidential campaign.

“I think they’ve hurt themselves and haven’t done the President any good either,” said Republican political consultant David Lewis. “There is a limit, and clearly they’ve gone over the line. Extreme statements like this are an embarrassment to the people represented by the congressmen making them, and that includes Republicans.”

During an Oval Office meeting last week, Hunter and Cunningham joined two other conservative GOP congressmen--Robert K. Dornan of Garden Grove and Sam Johnson of Texas--in encouraging Bush to hammer at Clinton about his efforts to avoid the draft and his 1969 visit to Moscow when he was a 23-year-old Rhodes Scholar at Oxford.

When Bush followed that advice, Clinton’s supporters quickly labeled the attack a baseless partisan smear and Clinton compared it to McCarthyism during Sunday night’s presidential debate.

Despite the growing controversy, neither Hunter nor Cunningham has expressed regret over taking part in an episode that could prove to be not only one of the defining moments of the presidential race but also the genesis of a character issue in their own reelection campaigns.

“The purpose I served was to bring the facts to the American people and let them be the judge,” Cunningham said in an interview Tuesday. “That’s not going to hurt me or the President. Everything I said was true and documented, and all the President has done is raise some questions in areas where Bill Clinton should level with the American public. My job is done. . . . Believe me, if Bill Clinton were running on the Republican ticket I’d be doing the same thing.”

Herbert and Gastil, however, hope to capitalize on the issue to improve their admittedly long odds of upsetting their incumbent opponents in San Diego County’s heavily Republican 51st and 52nd congressional districts, respectively.

“Hunter has taken negative campaigning to a new low in a way that would make the infamous creators of the Willie Horton ad blush,” Gastil said, referring to a controversial TV commercial used in Bush’s 1988 race that was widely criticized as a thinly veiled racist attack on Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis.

Hunter’s “Clinton-bashing baggage,” Gastil added, could ultimately harm his constituents if a Clinton Administration becomes a reality, a concern echoed by other San Diegans uninvolved in the congressional campaign.

“This is absolutely the kind of thing political grudges are made of,” said George Mitrovich, head of the San Diego City Club civic group and a political activist who has worked for both parties. “My question is, if Bill Clinton becomes President and the Democrats continue to control Congress, who will Mr. Hunter or Cunningham turn to when San Diego needs help?”

Similarly, Herbert argues that Cunningham’s caustic rhetoric has “painted him in a far-far-right corner” that could undermine his effectiveness in dealing with Democratic leaders in Congress and, perhaps after next January, the White House.

For example, Cunningham has compared Clinton’s Moscow trip to Tokyo Rose’s World War II activities--a comparison that even White House Chief of Staff James A. Baker III termed “outrageous.”