Brown Backs Roberti on Firearms Bill : Politics: State senator, who faces a recall, enlists the gubernatorial candidate as ‘co-sponsor’ of a measure to close loopholes in the ban on military-style assault weapons.

With only days remaining before his recall election, state Sen. David A. Roberti escalated his campaign Thursday by enlisting Treasurer Kathleen Brown’s support for a new bill to patch loopholes in his 5-year-old assault weapons ban.

Calling the legislation “a top priority of my comprehensive crime package,” Brown challenged Gov. Pete Wilson and others to line up behind the bill.

If passed, the legislation will broaden the scope of Roberti’s 1989 Assault Weapon Control Act by adding a generic description of military-style semiautomatic weapons to the law, which currently lists banned firearms by name.

Gun manufacturers have been getting around the law by making identical weapons under different names from those identified under the ban. They also skirt the ban by making slight changes in new models of forbidden guns.

Under sunny skies at a rural Sacramento firing range, Roberti introduced Brown as “a spokesperson and co-sponsor” of his legislation. Joined by San Francisco Dist. Atty. Arlo Smith, the politicians stood by as Senate Sgt. at Arms Tony Beard shot up watermelons in an effort to demonstrate the firepower of so-called copycat assault weapons.

“I know what it takes to pass gun control legislation,” Roberti said. “The gun lobby can beat the public with all kinds of political intimidation behind closed doors. . . . That’s why we need someone as public on our side as a candidate for governor.”

In recent weeks nothing, it seems, has raised the profile of the gun control debate like Roberti’s recall election in his San Fernando Valley district, with the national media portraying him as a David to the firearms lobby’s Goliath.

Roberti’s campaign has fueled that image, getting support from such prominent figures as former White House press secretary James Brady, who was wounded in an assassination attempt on former President Ronald Reagan; his wife, Sarah Brady, who heads Handgun Control Inc.; actor Beau Bridges, who played Brady in a TV movie, and survivors who lost family members in assault weapon violence.

Although recall proponents confirm that Roberti’s 1989 assault weapon ban spurred a movement against him, they say he is using the issue as a smoke screen to hide from charges of carpetbagging, political corruption and liberalism.

Asked why he waited until just days before his election to introduce his fix-it bill, Roberti blamed the timing on distractions created by the recall drive.

“This highlights the problem of the recall. It interrupts your term and the work you do,” the Van Nuys Democrat said, noting that he and Brown had been negotiating a bill for two months.

Until December, Roberti said, he felt his 1989 law was sufficient to control military-style semiautomatic weapons in California as long as state officials could continue to add more firearms to the banned list.

In fact, when he first introduced the bill five years ago, it had contained a generic description of military-style semiautomatic weapons that he later had to drop to get enough votes to pass the initial legislation.

Then, last December, a gun manufacturer obtained another in a series of court injunctions against the law that allows state officials to go after copycat weapons.

“That was the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Roberti said.

Wilson’s office said he has not yet seen the bill, which is tentatively scheduled to be assigned to a senate committee next week for its first public hearing.

“I can’t speak to Ms. Brown’s comments, but I do know the governor has a very good record in this area,” said Wilson spokesman Sean Walsh, noting that the governor signed the 1989 assault weapon ban.

Darry Sragow, gubernatorial campaign manager for Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi, said Garamendi supports the law, but added: “This is another example of Kathleen Brown trying to cover herself by adopting somebody else’s proposal. And she’s not even a member of the Legislature.”

Meanwhile, in the Valley, the 20th Senate District Republican Central Committee announced its endorsement of GOP candidate Dolores White, one of Roberti’s five opponents in the recall. White, 59, is a real estate broker who ran against Roberti in 1992.