Senators Reverse Styles to Match New Roles : Politics: Dianne Feinstein’s jump into the limelight is designed to boost bid in 1994. Barbara Boxer’s low-key approach is a ‘thank you’ to her colleague.

In the years before they entered the U.S. Senate, Barbara Boxer was known as a shrewd publicity seeker with a short attention span, while Dianne Feinstein was regarded as a cautious, low-key administrator who could deliberate issues to death.

So much for reputations.

Feinstein has wasted no time making a splash during her first two months in the 103rd Congress. She attracted attention by cracking the all-male Senate Judiciary Committee and introducing controversial legislation to protect the California desert. Feinstein also generated headlines by arranging an Oval Office visit with President Clinton and meeting with her sometime rival, California Gov. Pete Wilson.

The rocket-like launch of Feinstein’s Senate career contrasts with the subdued approach taken by Boxer, who waited until last week to call her first news conference of the year. The separate paths taken by California’s two Democratic senators offer an early glimpse at the legislative roles and political missions they are pursuing in Washington.

Facing a reelection campaign next year, Feinstein is under pressure to establish herself immediately and chalk up a string of highly visible accomplishments. Boxer, who will not face voters until 1998, has sidestepped the limelight to repay Feinstein for her valuable support during last year’s grueling campaign, aides say.

At the same time, Boxer appears determined to modify the ultra-liberal image she acquired as a House member over the past decade to gain credibility within the Senate--as well as solidifying her popularity among California voters.

“I am not changing who I am,” Boxer said in an interview. “It’s just that the Senate is a different place (from the House) and things are done differently. What I am interested in is getting the job done.”

Both senators said they are political soulmates who see eye to eye on most issues, including their top priority--providing federal assistance to help the California economy. They say they have talked nearly every day, though they have yet to share a private meal after pledging in early January to do so once a week.

Such camaraderie between senators representing the same state is unusual and, given the backgrounds of these two senators, no small achievement: Feinstein, a pragmatist and centrist, and Boxer, a liberal ideologue, have not always been on such friendly terms. In 1990, Boxer endorsed Feinstein’s opponent in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, and a decade ago Feinstein supported Boxer’s primary foe in her first bid for Congress.

“I don’t see two senators from a state huddling like you might see Barbara and I just schmoozing together,” Feinstein said.

Ann F. Lewis, a Democratic political consultant in Washington, said: “Watching Boxer and Feinstein reach out to one another in the last year is the most dramatic example in one state of what is happening nationally. They really are the role models for a different type of political success where women share their strengths instead of competing with one another.”

Although they ran historic campaigns together as the “Thelma and Louise” of politics and compose the first all-woman Senate delegation, Feinstein and Boxer are beginning to resent the intense media examination of their every move in the Senate. Feinstein said she finds some comparisons of her and Boxer “bizarre” and “chauvinistic.” She doubts whether two Democratic male senators from California would be subjected to the same level of scrutiny if they were elected in the same year.

Behind the appearance of cooperation, some tension has developed between the two staffs, if not the senators themselves. Aides on Capitol Hill say such friction is inevitable between two Senate offices representing the same party and state.

While lining up her Feb. 4 meeting with the President to discuss California’s agenda, Feinstein neither invited nor informed Boxer. Boxer staffers first learned about Feinstein’s meeting in a newspaper article. In retrospect, Feinstein said, she should have told Boxer in advance.

Recently, Boxer’s support as a co-sponsor of the desert protection bill was in jeopardy when she became aware of concessions that Feinstein made for Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee, according to two knowledgeable sources who asked not to be named. It was left largely to environmental leaders in Washington to reassure Boxer that the changes regarding a desert Army base were acceptable.

Both senators downplayed the episode.

“For five minutes my heart sort of stopped,” Boxer said. “I wanted to make sure that I hadn’t made a promise to Dianne that I couldn’t keep.”

Between now and 1994, Feinstein can expect the Senate Democratic leadership, which desperately wants to retain both seats from California, to provide her abundant opportunity to shine. This will include being given a lead role in sponsoring legislation, widespread support from her colleagues in pushing through initiatives such as the desert bill, and credit for bringing home federal projects to California.

On Wednesday, Sen. Paul Simon (D-Ill.) invited Feinstein to join him at a news conference to introduce legislation that would toughen licensing procedures for gun dealers. The occasion gave Feinstein the opportunity to appear before nine television cameras and a packed room of reporters to denounce the sale of guns by “cash-and-carry” dealers.

Moreover, her high-profile Judiciary assignment in the wake of the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings and the desert bill should promote Feinstein’s reelection efforts with two key groups--feminists and environmentalists.

“Those are two absolutely critical constituent groups that matter because of their money and their organizational resources,” said Bruce Cain, a UC Berkeley political scientist.

After joining Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun (D-Ill.) as the first women on the Judiciary panel, Feinstein startled the committee with her forceful and direct questioning of Zoe Baird, President Clinton’s failed nominee to lead the Justice Department. Feinstein peppered Baird with questions about her hiring of illegal immigrants before voicing strong doubts about her qualifications to become attorney general.

Feinstein’s assertiveness, rare for a new senator, sent her colleagues a loud message that she intends to be an influential player on the committee despite her newcomer status.

“She is impressive,” Sen. Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.) said after the Baird hearings.

By comparison, Boxer for the most part gently questioned Clinton Cabinet nominees who came before her banking and environment committees. This reflects Boxer’s strategy to keep a low profile as she goes about learning the internal workings of the Senate and getting to know her colleagues, aides say.

In effect, Boxer has deferred to Feinstein, who last fall offered important support that helped Boxer in her tougher race against Republican Bruce Herschensohn.

“I wouldn’t have won this election without Dianne,” Boxer said on her first day as a senator. “She was by my side when I needed her by my side.”

Said one aide: “Dianne Feinstein helped Barbara Boxer in the campaign for two basic reasons--she likes Barbara Boxer and she did not want to serve with a Republican colleague. I think Barbara Boxer will now help Dianne Feinstein for the same reasons.”

Thus, Feinstein was in the spotlight and Boxer was nowhere to be seen when Wilson visited Washington in early February. The governor came to meet with the California congressional delegation for support in seeking $1.5 billion in federal funds to help the state recover the cost of providing services to immigrants.

The meeting between Wilson and Feinstein was their first since their bitter gubernatorial race in 1990. Afterward, the two told reporters that they had put aside their differences.

Wilson met with Feinstein instead of Boxer because the former San Francisco mayor was more responsive to the governor’s initial request for help, said Wilson spokesman Dan Schnur.

Boxer, meanwhile, has not attracted attention the way she often did as a House member. While Feinstein called reporters and television crews to her office immediately after a 15-minute meeting with Clinton, Boxer did little to promote her 45-minute session aboard Air Force One en route to California last month.

As one of 435 House members, Boxer said, she was forced to create publicity to gain the political support of her colleagues.

“To get things done in the Senate is a very different situation,” Boxer said. “There are fewer people (and) there are leaders in certain areas that I have to do things with. I don’t feel I need to call a press conference because I am getting things done.”

Boxer’s overall strategy to keep a low profile may be paying off. She has been named to the Democratic steering panel that makes committee assignments and a leadership position as deputy whip.

Rated the second-most liberal senator by the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call at the beginning of the year, Boxer has made gradual movement toward the center.

In the House, Boxer frequently assailed the space station Freedom as a multibillion-dollar boondoggle and pushed for cancellation of the project. Now as senator of a state that stands to lose thousands of high-wage aerospace jobs if the space station is cut, Boxer said she could support a Clinton Administration plan to continue a lower level of funding for the project.

“She is smart enough to recognize that she’s got to moderate her politics,” said UC Berkeley’s Cain. “She knows that the Republicans perceive her as the weak link, and if she wants to stay in the Senate she has to mend her ways.”

Boxer said: “I’m just going to do what I think is right and sometimes it will be liberal, sometimes it will be the moderate range, sometimes it will be the conservative range.”

Boxer’s quiet beginning may not last much longer. Last month, she introduced her first piece of legislation--a proposal that would redirect funding from nuclear weapons laboratories to civilian research projects. Boxer also enlisted Sen. Robert Krueger (D-Tex.) to join her last week in offering “anti-stalker” legislation that would make it unlawful in certain situations for ex-spouses or jilted lovers to harass their former mates.