Democratic Party Official’s Suspension Lifted : Election: Political director who revealed Herschensohn’s visit to strip club is assigned to do research on Gov. Wilson. GOP responds with angry memo to state party chief.

The California Democratic Party official who was suspended for revealing U.S. Senate candidate Bruce Hershensohn’s visits to a Hollywood strip joint and adult newsstands will be back on the job Monday and his new assignment will be to research Republican Gov. Pete Wilson.

“We’re going to make 1993 as miserable for Wilson as Nov. 3 was,” Bob Mulholland said during a telephone interview from his home in Chico in Butte County.

He was referring to the defeat of Proposition 165, Wilson’s initiative that would have cut welfare benefits and given him broad new budgetary powers, the governor’s failure to elect large numbers of new Republicans to the state Assembly, and the lopsided election loss that Democrat Dianne Feinstein handed John Seymour, the former state legislator appointed by Wilson to fill the remainder of his U.S. Senate term.

Mulholland, political director of the state party since April, 1991, was suspended Oct. 30 by party Chairman Phil Angelides for releasing the details about Herschensohn’s private life without Angelides’ approval.

But the party chief said Friday that from the beginning he viewed Mulholland’s suspension more a matter “of days than months” because the main problem was that he released the information without approval.

“I did not approve of what he did. I really didn’t,” Angelides said. But he said that “Bob Mulholland told the truth. The problem was that he defied our organizational rule. I run this party.”

Herschensohn supporters reject that explanation. On Thursday, Ken Khachigian, Herschensohn’s campaign manager, blasted Angelides in a memo to California political reporters. Khachigian called Mulholland a “dirty trickster” and referred to the party chairman as Phil “The Sleaze” Angelides.

Khachigian repeated what he said after the election, that he did not believe the release of the information was the reason that Herschensohn lost to Democratic Sen.-elect Barbara Boxer. But Khachigian denounced the release of information about a Herschensohn visit to the Seventh Veil, a Hollywood strip joint, and his purchase of adult magazines at a Los Angeles newsstand.

Khachigian said: “Bruce Hershensohn was victimized by a dirty trick at the end of this campaign. Maybe it didn’t affect the outcome of the election--but that’s irrelevant now. What’s relevant is that the Democratic Party put its imprimatur on a slimy, tawdry device fully intended to boost the lagging fortunes of Barbara Boxer and stop the momentum of the Herschensohn campaign.”

Khachigian continued to assert that Boxer orchestrated the disclosure.

Angelides called Khachigian’s commentary “hooey.”

As for Mulholland, he said he was looking forward to opposing Wilson’s reelection bid in 1994. Neither Angelides nor Mulholland could explain what Mulholland’s job entails. He will be involved in researching opponents’ backgrounds, as he did with Herschensohn, and doing whatever else he can to get Democrats elected, they said.

“Last Tuesday’s election was probably the worst day in Wilson’s life, but I think the election in November of 1994 will be an even worse day,” Mulholland said. “I will be doggin’ him and doggin’ him and doggin’ him. . . . We are clearly committed to having a Democratic governor in ’94.”

As for Herschensohn, he said the Republican should not wait for an apology card.