D.C. Ties Help Rep. Harman, but May Haunt Her

For her husband’s 75th birthday, Rep. Jane Harman (D-Marina del Rey) invited a few friends over to celebrate.

Defense Secretary Les Aspin stopped by, as did Robert E. Rubin, President Clinton’s director of the National Economic Council. Old friends Mollie Raiser, Clinton’s chief of protocol, and former California Sen. John V. Tunney wouldn’t have missed it.

House Speaker Thomas S. Foley showed up, appropriately enough, because the party was held in his office at the Capitol.

Not bad for a freshman member of Congress who pulled off a surprise victory last November on her first run for office.

A former White House official under Jimmy Carter, Harman, 48, has built up a powerful array of political, social and business connections since she began living and working in Washington in the 1970s. That network has helped her gain influence far beyond that of a typical congressional first-termer.

Yet it also is double-edged for Harman politically. She pointedly spurns the label of Washington insider. In her campaign last year she had to fend off charges of carpetbagging from her Republican opponent, then-L.A. Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores.

In a move likely to become political fodder in her reelection campaign next year, Harman re-enrolled her two younger children in Washington schools this year to spend more time with them and trim some of her weekend district visits.

In the recession-wracked South Bay district she represents, Harman will have to make the case that her deep Washington background can produce results.

So far she has been able to capitalize on her network of powerful Washington friends to get choice committee assignments and the ear of White House officials when she wants to promote her ideas.

Aspin, old pal and then-chairman, helped her land a seat on the Armed Services Committee, unusual for a freshman. She also sits on the Science, Space and Technology Committee, chaired by California colleague Rep. George E. Brown Jr. (D-Colton). Both panels give her opportunities to shape legislation that could protect threatened high-tech aerospace jobs in her 36th District.

Her close ties to Aspin provided a personal lobbying channel to keep the Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo off the dreaded base-closing list. She also teamed up with other Los Angeles area lawmakers to spare the Long Beach Naval Shipyard. Indeed, before the Pentagon’s list was released in mid-March, Harman confidently pooh-poohed an early and erroneous report that the shipyard would be targeted.

On friendly terms with Foley, she was recently named Democratic chairwoman of a freshman task force on implementing the Administration’s “reinventing government” proposals.

When Harman introduced legislation to offer tax breaks to defense contractors who switch to commercial pursuits, Rubin came to her office to offer counsel.

Harman grew up in West Los Angeles, where she lost her first run for office--treasurer of her Emerson Junior High School class.

She arrived in Washington in 1964 as a college intern and something clicked.

“Somehow the seeds were planted early. But I didn’t set about my whole life to build a career so I could run (for Congress). I, frankly, never expected to have the opportunity, and I did a lot of other things.”

It’s those other things that have provided her invaluable stockpile of powerful friends.

Married in 1980, Harman met her husband--Sidney, an audio equipment mogul--in the Carter White House when he was undersecretary of commerce and she was deputy Cabinet secretary.

In addition to her tour in the Carter White House, Harman worked as one of Tunney’s senior aides and was named chief counsel and staff director of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee, the first woman to hold such a post.

After working as Defense Department counsel, Harman practiced law at Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue, a top Washington law firm with offices nationwide. She also has been active in Democratic Party fund raising.

That varied experience has not only filled her Rolodex but taught her how Washington works.

“I am someone who certainly understands the system, (and) loved being in it in the ‘70s. But I then learned how the private sector works. I’m very comfortable in the business world, and a lot of my friends and supporters are business people, many of whom are not Democrats. . . . So it’s an eclectic set of acquaintances, and it’s the combination that works so well. If I only knew one group and I didn’t know the other group, I couldn’t do as much.”

Harman moved to Los Angeles only a year before the 1992 election. Sidney Harman has long business ties to California and maintains his headquarters in Northridge.

Harman had already surveyed the political landscape awaiting her.

She knew that former Rep. Mel Levine was running for the Senate and a seat would be open. With that in mind, the Harmans settled in Brentwood, within Levine’s old district boundaries, but moved to Marina del Rey to be in the reapportioned 36th District, where Harman decided to make her stand.

The district, which runs along the coast from Venice to San Pedro, was considered unwinnable by most Democratic observers.

But she put together a nimble campaign organization that emphasized abortion rights and saving the district’s high-tech jobs. Blending moderate and liberal views, she defeated the conservative Flores, whose anti-abortion stance cost her moderate Republican support. Harman won by 16,000 votes.

More than half ($823,000) of the $1.6 million she spent on the race came from her own pocket. More than $210,000 came from political action committees representing special interests.

She immediately became one of the most experienced freshmen in Congress.

“Jane knows everybody,” said Rep. Robert Matsui (D-Sacramento), a birthday party guest and Harman confidant.

“And when she calls, everyone shows up--like (U.S. Ambassador to France) Pamela Harriman and (Senate Majority Leader) George Mitchell,” said Matsui, recalling past parties and fund-raisers. “In Washington, where relationships are so important, she’s light-years ahead.”

Even Republicans who have observed Harman’s work on the Armed Services Committee give her “pretty high marks for being well-informed on the issues,” according to a staffer.

Harman speaks in rapid-fire chunks, carving her sentences as if she has anticipated all the questions. She casually displays her braininess but leavens it with a warm, if edgy, sense of humor.

On key political issues, she comes up with cautious slogans, more noteworthy for their alliteration than their decisiveness--”Not Now for NAFTA,” and “Listen, Then Lead” on the Clinton health reform plan.

She seems genuinely fired up about this chapter in her life. And Matsui, an eight-term veteran and Harman mentor, likes what he sees in her future.

“She’s definitely capable of bigger things, maybe in the House leadership. If (Sen. Dianne) Feinstein decides to seek national office, then Jane might think about the Senate.”

Harman can expect a tough reelection battle in ’94. A Democratic voter registration drive last year whittled the GOP advantage to two percentage points, but Republicans are eager for a rematch.

“We’re going to get her,” said Tirso Del Junco, chairman of the California Republican Party. “She is our No. 1 target. She ran on a very conservative platform and then voted for every Clinton tax proposal. How is she going to be able to come back to the district and hide her voting record?”

Rancho Palos Verdes Mayor Susan Brooks, a Republican who favors abortion rights, has already filed to run for Harman’s seat.

Harman’s survival plan is simple: abortion rights, moderate economic views and a fixation on retooling the high-tech defense jobs that for decades fueled the Southern California boom and kept the Hughes, Lockheed and TRW plants in the district humming.

She wants to redirect that labor force to the production of cleaner manufacturing processes, safer waste disposal techniques and electric vehicles, and she imagines the district emerging as a kind of new Silicon Valley for an estimated $200-billion “green technologies” industry.

In addition to tax incentives for defense contractors, she has pushed for deeper budget cuts, the line-item veto and targeted capital gains tax cuts--all issues that please her business supporters.

She was an early opponent of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which is backed by the White House and her good friend Matsui. “We understand that she’s got a tough district,” said one of the treaty’s supporters.

Harman said the recent death of her mother gave her “a real opportunity to review how I got here” and made her “a little quieter, but more resolved.”

Her mother was a lifelong smoker who died of lung cancer, and Harman is certain of one thing in the Clinton health reform plan.

“There is no (cigarette) tax too high for me.”

Profile: Jane Harman

* Born: June 28, 1945.

* Residence: Marina del Rey.

* Education: Smith College, Harvard Law School.

* Career highlights: Democratic congresswoman from California’s 36th District; chief counsel, Senate judiciary subcommittee; deputy Cabinet secretary in Carter White House; attorney.

* Interests: Tennis, bicycling.

* Family: Married, with four children.

* Quote: “I’m very comfortable in the business world, and a lot of my friends and supporters are business people, many of whom are not Democrats.”