Allen Becomes Instant Outcast in Own Party

Newly elected Assembly Speaker Doris Allen on Monday became an instant pariah with her Orange County Republican colleagues, who called her a “shill” and a “puppet” of former Speaker Willie Brown as they vented outrage over her dramatic ascension.

“I think Doris Allen is Willie Brown in drag,” said state Sen. Ross Johnson (R-Irvine), the former Assemblyman who defeated Allen in the 35th Senate District’s Republican primary in March. “She is his handpicked replacement, elected with 39 Democrat votes and one Republican vote, her own. It is pathetic. She is regarded as a pathetic figure by everyone except Doris Allen. [The Democrats] privately have nothing but contempt for her.”

Republicans in the Legislature were particularly angry that the vote came on the eve of the expected election of Bob Margett in a Republican-dominated district in the San Gabriel Valley. That would have given the GOP a 40-39 bulge over Democrats in the Assembly, but Allen’s election, and the rules adopted by the Democrats with her vote, checkmated what had been a presumptive Republican takeover of the lower chamber.

While ultraconservative Republicans immediately began talking about recalling Allen, no one in the delegation would endorse that idea Monday.

“It depends,” said Assemblyman Bill Morrow (R-Oceanside). “It depends on Doris too. A lot of what happens depends on Doris.”

Democrats in the county welcomed the news; reacting with everything from hearty laughter to exclamations of joy. Many local officials in her district praised Allen for her service to the community and said her selection should help promote bipartisanship.

Seal Beach Mayor George Brown called her election “quite a coup,” adding that the Assembly vote proves that Allen “can bring both sides together.”

“I’m really proud of her. I think she’ll do a great job,” said Brown, a Republican, a councilman for three years and a resident of Leisure World in Seal Beach. “It took a lot of guts to do what she did. . . . It’s time to quit squabbling and get on with the state’s business.”

Jim Toledano, head of the county Democratic Party, said Allen’s selection is “obviously good for Orange County and good for the process.”

“One hopes Doris Allen is not the only Republican who figures out that pure bloody partisanship is not good for California,” he said. “So far, she is the only Republican that would deal with these problems on a bipartisan basis.”

Talk about a recall began in Orange County among members of the California Republican Assembly, a hard-line conservative group with 18 chapters in the county.

Republican Assembly members were difficult to contact in the afternoon because they were in a strategy session.

Orange County Republican Party Chairman Thomas A. Fuentes, who spoke with several members of the county’s delegation, said the day’s events offered a mixed blessing, and he expressed particular concern about rule changes that could put the Republicans at a disadvantage by giving Allen control of GOP committee chairmanships and conference committee membership.

“I think everybody is taking joy in not having Willie as speaker but frustrated from the standpoint that the new Speaker was picked by the Democrats and not the Republican caucus members, who have labored so long to get rid of Willie Brown and take control and shift the agenda and direction of the Assembly,” Fuentes said.

“There is a lot of heat at the moment surrounding this vote,” he said, when asked to comment on a possible recall of Allen. “There is a lot of anger in the way it has come down. I would like a little calm to come to the waters in assessing what the party will do.”

Sen. Rob Hurtt (R-Garden Grove) called it “a dark, gloomy day for Orange County,” and said his desk was already peppered with phone slips from people in the county who want to start a recall.

Saying that Allen had to rely on Brown to help her properly adjourn the session, he called her “a puppet, a shill. I hope she got more than 30 pieces of silver. We know what happened to Judas in the end, and I don’t see any difference here.”

Several Democrats said Allen’s allying herself with the Democrats had been born of her poor treatment at the hands of her GOP colleagues.

Former Assemblyman Tom Umberg, who gave a hearty laugh when told that Allen had become speaker, said that “there was little room for an independent woman in the GOP caucus. They should not have treated her so shabbily in the past. She was never taken seriously by the Republican caucus, which has been dominated by extreme right-wingers.”

Then-Assemblyman Johnson’s move to Irvine so he could run in the coastal 35th Senate District contributed to Allen’s aligning with the Democrats. Johnson was backed in the Republican primary by all of the Orange County delegation. Allen felt cheated that her colleagues took sides in the contest for the seat, which was in her district and was being relinquished by Supervisor Marian Bergeson.

Republicans rejected the idea that they had sewn their own doom by not respecting the seven-term assemblywoman, who is the senior Republican in the lower chamber.

Assemblyman Morrow said he had “no feelings of regret, none whatsoever” about how the Assembly delegation had handled the Senate primary contest.

Hurtt said: “Ross got some endorsements and a little bit of money. If she wants to be bitter about it, that doesn’t get anybody much. . . . She didn’t get any support because she wouldn’t do anything for anybody.”

Times staff writer Len Hall contributed to this story.