ELECTIONS / 20TH STATE SENATE DISTRICT : Roberti Backed by Outsiders’ Money, Foe Contends

State Sen. David Roberti is trying to buy a victory in the April 12 recall election with money donated mostly by supporters from outside the San Fernando Valley, challenger Randy Linkmeyer charged on Wednesday.

Almost 90% of the $193,865 in large contributions Roberti reported raising in his last campaign finance disclosure report came from people, firms or organizations with addresses outside Roberti’s 20th Senate District, which includes most of the Valley, Linkmeyer said.

Linkmeyer, a Canoga Park gun store owner, is one of five candidates seeking to replace Roberti if he is recalled by the voters Tuesday.

Roberti aides responded that Linkmeyer’s charges were “totally hypocritical” because the recall drive has been heavily underwritten by gun-rights supporters from outside the district. Besides, they argued, it is fitting that Roberti get outside campaign donations because the recall has become--by design of the anti-Roberti camp itself--a nationally watched showdown over gun control.

“The recall (transcends) the 20th District and Senator Roberti--it’s a referendum on assault weapons,” said Staci Walters, Roberti’s press secretary.

Linkmeyer, 37, a Sherman Oaks resident and owner of Art’s Guns, stepped up his attacks on Roberti at a news conference in Van Nuys. “Here’s a gentleman (Roberti) who is a carpetbagger,” Linkmeyer said. “And now here’s all this money coming from the outside.”

Roberti lives in Los Feliz, outside the district, but rents a home in Van Nuys to maintain his legally required residency within its boundaries.

A Times review of those who contributed $100 or more to Roberti’s Beat the Recall campaign committee confirmed the substance of Linkmeyer’s allegation. Many of Roberti’s biggest contributors came from political action committees with headquarters outside the district.

Linkmeyer, a Republican, said that if he is elected he would seek reforms that, among other things, would require that 50% of a candidate’s money come from within the district they seek to represent.

“I’m seeking to give back control of the political process to the people of the district,” said Linkmeyer, who has developed the most ambitious campaign of the five Roberti challengers. “We’re not seeing people from the Valley saying ‘Yes, we’re for Roberti’ and opening up their checkbooks for him.”

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Linkmeyer also said he would support reforms to prevent transfers of campaign contributions between candidates so contributors will not have their money spent on causes with which they might disagree. Linkmeyer pointed out that Roberti’s Beat the Recall committee reported getting $7,800 from the campaign committees of six other politicians, including those of Sen. Nicholas Petris (D-Oakland) and Assemblyman John Vasconcellos (D-San Jose).

Such a ban would bring a new honesty to the electoral process, he said.

Meanwhile, Roberti aides pointed out that the recall campaign has been heavily financed by gun-rights groups from outside the Valley, an observation borne out by campaign finance records filed by three organizations most heavily involved in sponsoring the recall--the Coalition to Restore Government Integrity, Californians Against Corruption and California Voters Alliance.

The last campaign report filed by Californians Against Corruption, for example, showed that only three of this organization’s 31 contributions came from Valley residents and that four of its eight largest contributors were non-Californians.

However, Linkmeyer’s own most recent report showed that only 20% of the $4,328 he raised came from sources outside the district.

During his news conference, Linkmeyer also conceded to reporters that he would not ban contribution practices that have been employed by gun-rights advocates in the Roberti campaign. Asked if he would limit non-monetary contributions by outside interests, Linkmeyer said he would not.

Recall organizers have developed a tactic in which partisans scattered throughout the nation get a so-called recall kit that includes a prototype of a piece of anti-Roberti mail and a list of voters. The recipients then duplicate the piece, and stamp and mail the copies at their own expense.

Such in-kind contributions would not be affected by the reforms he envisions, Linkmeyer told reporters. However, he noted that the same exception would be available to all.

In another development Wednesday, Roberti teamed up with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Kathleen Brown to propose legislation to tighten a 1989 law Roberti wrote that bans military-style semiautomatic weapons in California.

At a news conference in San Francisco, the pair called for amending state law to ban an entire breed of firearms they would define as assault weapons. Currently, the ban applies to about 60 weapons identified by their brand names, such as the Uzi or AK-47.

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According to Roberti’s aides, weapons makers skirt the law by producing “copycat” weapons, basically identical to the banned firearms, but exempt from its provisions because they are different in some small way. To prevent this, Roberti and Brown are now proposing a new generic definition of what constitutes an assault weapon. “It’s time to end the assault-weapons maker’s game,” according to a press release from Roberti’s office about the new proposal.

Because the recall drive has been heavily influenced by gun-rights advocates angered by the senator’s 1989 ban, Roberti’s decision to publicly advocate an even more restrictive law appeared to some observers to signal confidence in the Roberti camp that the recall battle is as good as won. A Times poll taken two weeks ago showed Roberti with a wide lead.