Democrats Urge Censure for Richter

Led by Assembly Minority Leader Richard Katz, 25 Democratic lawmakers called Tuesday for Republican Assemblyman Bernie Richter to be censured for his “McCarthy-like tactics” and “disgusting, inexcusable behavior” during last week’s hearings on affirmative action in higher education.

In a letter to Speaker Curt Pringle, the Democrats said Richter was wrong to ask Cal State Northridge President Blenda J. Wilson and Community College Chancellor Thomas Nussbaum whether they were testifying under the influence of drugs.

Such questioning, the letter said, was “repulsive and embarrassing, not only to the innocent parties injured by [Richter’s] actions, but to the entire membership of the Assembly. . . . This type of behavior . . . must be punished.”

The Democrats’ letter--which prompted an immediate and equally in-your-face response from Richter--came as the Chico assemblyman prepared for the final hearing of his budget subcommittee on education finance, which convenes today at Burbank City Hall.

Like the previous hearings, this one will investigate how race and gender preferences are used in the state’s public colleges. Barry Munitz, the chancellor of the 23-campus Cal State system, is scheduled to testify, and three of the Democrats who called for Richter’s censure have pledged to attend.

In his own letter to Pringle on Tuesday, Richter accused Katz of personally attacking him “to provide cover for [Katz’s] support of the existing indefensible system” of affirmative action. Calling Katz’s letter “hysterical” and “bombastic,” Richter defended the questioning of witnesses about drug use--a practice that is unheard of in legislative hearings--saying it was routine in sworn depositions.

“Unless a witness is asked the standard question . . . he or she could later plead that his/her answers were inaccurate due to the effects of such pharmaceuticals,” Richter wrote. “When Mr. Katz treats this routine process as somehow an ‘insult’ or ‘demeaning,’ he reconfirms his morally bankrupt position. . . .”

In an interview, Richter insisted that while only the first witnesses in the morning and afternoon--Wilson and Nussbaum--were asked directly about drug use during the hearing in dispute, everyone was held to the same standard because other witnesses were asked whether they understood the ground rules set forth at the start.

“It was not that we singled out anyone,” Richter said.

In addition to questioning Richter’s tactics, the Democrats suggested that Robert J. Corry, an attorney Richter hired to question witnesses during the hearings, may have a conflict of interest because he is involved in litigation challenging state affirmative action programs.

This prompted Richter to fling Katz’s reference to Sen. Joe McCarthy back at Katz.

“It is Mr. Katz who mirrors the debauched behavior of Sen. McCarthy, whose personal and professional demise began when he stooped to malign young staff members,” Richter wrote.

Richter said Tuesday that before he hired Corry, he asked the legislative counsel’s office whether there would be a conflict.

“The speaker [Pringle] was very concerned this not be done in any way that would create any kind of a conflict,” Richter said. “There were extensive discussions and arguments. We took a week and a half to resolve that issue.”

Katz--who went so far Tuesday as to call Richter a “racist psychopath”--was not the first lawmaker to question Richter’s conduct in recent hearings.

Last week, state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Los Angeles) sent a letter to the Fair Political Practices Commission, the State Bar of California and the legislative counsel seeking an investigation into the Corry’s hiring and Richter’ behavior.

“The focus of Assemblyman Richter is his charge that state funds have been used by university officials to oppose Proposition 209,” Hayden wrote, referring to the ballot measure to end affirmative action that counts Richter among its staunchest supporters.

But Richter’s hearings, Hayden said, are “thinly disguised to promote his side of Proposition 209, appearing to use state funds in exactly the way he claims the targets of his investigation do.”

In an interview, Hayden added: “Is the pot calling the kettle black?”

Richter, meanwhile, again defended the new round of hearings, saying that many educators who testified at similar sessions in the spring gave “disingenuous replies” when asked about how the taxpayers’ money is spent on affirmative action. The timing of the new hearings, he said, has nothing to do with Proposition 209.