ELECTIONS : State Treasurer Backs Roberti Weapons Bill : Politics: Valley senator escalates his fight against recall campaign by gaining the support of Kathleen Brown.

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 weapon ban.

Roberti’s move elevates the battle over his San Fernando Valley seat into the realm of gubernatorial politics as Brown--the front-running Democratic candidate for governor--stepped forward to champion the senator’s bill.

Calling the legislation “a top priority of my comprehensive crime package,” Brown challenged Gov. Pete Wilson and other prominent figures 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 semiautomatic guns to the law, which now lists banned weapons by name.

Firearms 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 Tony Beard, Senate sergeant at arms, 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 in explaining why he sought a high-profile personality like Brown to back his bill. “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, with the national media portraying him as a David to the firearms lobby’s Goliath.

Roberti’s campaign has fueled that image, recruiting the backing of 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 to assault weapon violence.

While 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 his 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.

Up until December, Roberti said, he felt that his 1989 law was sufficient to control assault weapons in California, as long as state officials could continue to add more guns to the list of banned firearms.

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

Then, in 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.

Brown said the bill fits in perfectly with her campaign message of trying to reverse California’s down slide.

“I think the issue is the decline of California--in the economy, in the number of jobs lost, in the quality of education and in the decline in safety,” Brown said.

“It is so important that we move beyond simple slogans and 30-second spots and join together--Republican and Democrat, Pete Wilson and Kathleen Brown--to support this legislation,” Brown 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.

But Darry Sragow, gubernatorial campaign manager for Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi, took a shot at his boss’s Democratic primary rival, saying, “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.”

At any rate, Sragow said, Garamendi supports a generic ban on assault weapons.

The final Democrat in the primary, state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica), will lend his support to Roberti’s bill too, said his spokesman, Duane Peterson.

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 previously ran against Roberti in 1992.