President Is Set to Endorse Woo in Mayoral Race

President Clinton has decided to endorse City Councilman Michael Woo in the Los Angeles mayoral race and will make a joint appearance with the candidate Tuesday in Van Nuys, White House aides said Friday.

Clinton could issue a statement this weekend endorsing Woo, a White House official said, adding that details of the language and timing of the endorsement were being discussed.

The joint appearance, at a job training program at Los Angeles Valley College, will take place on turf of considerable importance to Woo and Clinton. Woo must make substantial inroads into the large voting population of the San Fernando Valley to beat Richard Riordan.

Clinton wants to shore up his support among the sort of middle-class suburban voters who predominate in the Valley and who provided his margin of victory in last fall’s election.

“We haven’t been to the Valley. We wanted to make sure we’re touching as many communities as we can,” a White House official said.

Although the mayoral race is officially nonpartisan and presidents seldom involve themselves directly in such local contests, a White House official noted that “Woo was an early endorser of the President” and shares much of his agenda, from community policing to investments in high technology.

“He would be a reliable spokesperson for the President’s agenda,” the official said. By contrast, although several prominent Clinton supporters are heavily involved in Riordan’s campaign, the official said that “Riordan was a heavy Bush supporter, he’s supported by (Jack) Kemp and (Gov. Pete) Wilson, he doesn’t believe in the same things we do.”

Clinton will be accompanied by Commerce Secretary Ronald H. Brown during a one-hour stop at the community college that is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. Brown has been designated the Administration’s liaison to California as the state seeks to regain its economic footing.

Clinton and Brown will then appear in South-Central Los Angeles, where they are expected to highlight Administration proposals for reviving inner-city neighborhoods as well as Clinton’s general economic plan. That site was not disclosed Friday.

Despite his decision to weigh in on the Los Angeles race, Clinton expressed doubts about the value of such endorsements on local elections. Asked at a news conference Friday about his efforts on behalf of Democratic Sen. Bob Krueger of Texas, an appointed congressman facing a tough election fight, the President said he has “always been skeptical about the question of whether any of us can have any impact on anyone else’s race.”

“I’ve never seen it happen, up or down, in my own state, in Arkansas,” he said. Clinton added that in his campaigns for state office in Arkansas, “I never let anybody come in to help me--whatever the national politics were.”

Riordan, in a written statement, said: “This endorsement further underscores Woo’s weakness as a candidate without a message. It insults the intelligence of all Los Angeles voters that Woo has reduced safety, jobs and education to a partisan issue. Angelenos want real change at City Hall and demand leadership, not partisanship.”

Woo, in an appearance Friday evening with Commerce Secretary Brown in Los Angeles, refused to comment on any impending presidential announcement. But in response to Riordan, he said: “I think any candidate for public office would be honored to receive the endorsement of the President of the United States.”

Locally, several political consultants with ties to the Democratic Party privately questioned the wisdom of Clinton’s endorsement and its benefit for Woo.

“Frankly, I’m shocked that he would do it,” one consultant said.

Another Democratic consultant said: “I don’t know whether it helps or hurts Woo. Here is a guy (Clinton) who everyone west of the San Diego Freeway and north of the 101 (Hollywood Freeway) is waiting to (have) raise their taxes and cut into their Social Security.

“What Woo needs is Pat Riley, Tommy Lasorda and Clint Eastwood. He needs white guys who are symbols of success, and I don’t know that Bill Clinton is that. . . . He’s looking more and more like Jimmy Carter every day.”

The consultant said Clinton’s actions may be prompted by worries that a Riordan victory could make the multimillionaire businessman a prominent GOP player overnight. And that, the consultant said, could mean problems for Clinton and Democrats in the 1996 California primary.

“I think if Riordan wins, he could become the state’s most important Republican officeholder. . . . He could be vice presidential timber,” the consultant said.

Times staff writers Ronald Brownstein, Greg Krikorian and James Rainey contributed to this story in Los Angeles.

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