Suddenly, Democrats a Force in Central County

In America’s most Republican of counties, election day was an insurrection of sorts, a palace coup that--for now at least--has Democrats reigning over central Orange County communities.

The area, largely locked up by the GOP in recent times, did an about-face with the help of women, Latinos and Asians who joined with union members and moderates to power a trio of Democrats to seats in the Legislature and Congress.

Though Republicans remain firmly in control elsewhere in the county, the election marked the first time in a decade that Democrats have held more than a single partisan seat in Orange County.

And the results were convincing. Rep. Loretta Sanchez of Garden Grove trounced conservative Robert K. Dornan in a bitter rematch of their 1996 nail-biter, while Democrat Lou Correa engineered an impressive victory in his second try to unseat Assemblyman Jim Morrissey (R-Santa Ana).

But the most stunning result came in the 34th Senate District, where trial attorney Joe Dunn scratched to victory over state Sen. Rob Hurtt (R-Garden Grove). It was a win rich in symbolism: Hurtt is one of the most conservative Republicans in the Legislature and loathed by Sacramento Democrats for his million-dollar contributions to conservative candidates and causes in the 1990s.

The big Democratic victories in Orange County were, in part, the product of a heavy turnout of Latino voters. In addition, Dornan’s backing in the Asian community, a base of GOP support in 1996, eroded substantially Tuesday. Meanwhile, female voters and moderates voiced their frustration with Dornan and his conservative stands.

With a massive get-out-the-vote effort, Democrats brought this diverse mix of groups together like never before.

“It’s just going to be very difficult for any conservative Republican to win that area,” said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College.

In the past, conservative Republicans who railed against communism, as Dornan did, could almost take the Vietnamese American vote for granted, especially among older immigrants. No more.

“When they first came here as refugees, anti-communism was at the top of their thinking, and Mr. Dornan was able to attract a lot of votes with his strongly anti-communist rhetoric. But that has changed,” said Dinh Le, president of the Vietnamese American Phoenix Democratic Club.

“They realize that they have to take care of themselves, and that may mean voting Democratic,” he said.

Meanwhile, gubernatorial nominee Dan Lungren and other Republican candidates running statewide got only lukewarm approval from Orange County voters, who in previous elections had been the backbone of GOP victories in major California races.

Lungren eked out less than a 50,000-vote margin in the county as Democrat Gray Davis cruised to victory. Democrat Controller Kathleen Connell, meanwhile, actually ran better in Orange County than her Republican challenger. Even Orange County’s native son candidate, outgoing Assemblyman Curt Pringle (R-Garden Grove), managed only a 95,000-vote edge as he lost for state treasurer.

“It’s a repudiation of the Republican machine in Orange County,” said Eileen Padberg, a Republican political consultant from Newport Beach long at odds with her hometown party.

Padberg said that women, especially, are supporting more moderate politicians.

“People are saying to conservative Republicans, ‘We’ll take care of our own family values, you take care of crime and taxes and running government. Stay out of our personal lives,’ ” she said.

Conservatives, however, saw their bitter losses in central Orange County as a byproduct of a Democratic tide nationwide.

Conservatives are convinced they can remain potent players in elections to come, despite a decided Democratic registration edge and the dramatic demographic shifts to the area in recent decades. Latino voters, in particular, have taken a more active role in electoral politics.

Thomas A. Fuentes, county GOP chairman, said his party “will be back” in two years.

“One has to look at the top of the ticket and national and statewide trends as having significant impact on those races in central Orange County on this particular day,” he said. “They were impacted by a much larger circumstance. It was a good day for Democrats and a bad day for Republicans.

A Change in Politics, Political Psyche

Jeff Flint, a GOP strategist, said Republicans need to refocus.

“The message is Republicans need to get a message,” Flint said. “I think that Republicans should focus on core economic issues like tax cuts, economic growth and job growth.”

Money, of course, also played a significant role. Sanchez and Dornan raised more than $6.3 million altogether, making it the most expensive congressional race in the nation this year. The spillover from the highly publicized race helped Dunn and Correa in their overlaying state Senate and Assembly districts.

Democrats also benefited from organized labor being aroused in June by the anti-union Proposition 226. “They were awakened and stayed awake,” Flint said.

Wylie A. Aitken, the trial lawyer who first backed Sanchez two years ago and is one of the wizards behind the Democratic resurgence in central Orange County, says the triple victory represents a sea change not only for the region’s politics but also for its political psyche.

“For a long time, people thought it wasn’t OK to be a Democrat in Orange County,” Aitken said. Even traditional Democrats, he said, “felt peer pressure to conform to a social value that said you had to be a Republican. Now people can hold their heads up high and be proud to be a Democrat.”

Democratic leaders and strategists say that’s because candidates like Dunn, Correa and Sanchez are centrists who try to address pressing problems that affect the average voter.

“These are people who talk about real family values,” Aitken said. “Our candidates speak to the issues that touch people were they live, where they shop, where they work, where they see the doctor and where their kids go to school. That’s why we won.”

An Quy Le, an avid Dornan supporter two years ago, said he changed his vote after seeing Sanchez at demonstrations in Little Saigon to protest religious persecution and political oppression in Vietnam.

“Every time we have a political gathering, she is right there with us,” said Le, 65, of Westminster. “Sometimes she even dresses up in an ao dai [traditional Vietnamese dress] with the Vietnamese flag on it. I think she really supports our community.”

Democrats Don’t Plan to Rest on Laurels

The new Democrats of central Orange County aren’t afraid to spread their arms open to a wider constituency. In a victory speech that would have fit in San Francisco, Sanchez handed out plaudits not only to labor unions and Latinos, but also to her gay supporters and EMILY’s List, the nationally powerful pro-choice woman’s political action committee.

Democrats do not expect to rest on their laurels.

The Democratic Foundation of Orange County already has its sights set on central Orange County’s 68th Assembly District seat. Although a Republican, Ken Maddox, captured the spot Tuesday with 53.6% of the vote, Democrats say schoolteacher Mike Matsuda ran well despite a shortage of cash. They see the possibilities of a rematch, with Matsuda getting better funding.

“If I were Maddox, I wouldn’t buy a home in Sacramento,” Aitken said.

Art Montez of the League of United Latin American Citizens said the big Democratic showing in Central County was less a function of partisanship than a message that Republican elected officials haven’t been providing for the basic needs of society, like taking care of the young, schoolchildren and the elderly.

“The reality is that people are tired of the ideological wars,” Montez said. “The Republicans overextended the witch hunt.”

While the GOP acknowledged the importance of the Latino vote, Montez said, it couldn’t deliver the message they most wanted to hear--that overcrowded inner-county schools will get money to replace portable classrooms and that breakfast and lunch programs will be restored.

“I have to give credit to the Republicans because they called me no less than every other day to vote for Hurtt,” said Montez, a Democrat who lives in Anaheim. “They were trying to get us to cross over and, in doing so, they reminded us that we needed to vote.

“All of a sudden, we were getting a lot of invitations to go to the dance,” he said. “But we decided to dance with a different partner.”

“You have to acknowledge today that the Latino vote matters,” said Lucia de Garcia, a member of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly of Orange County and CEO of Elan International in Newport Beach.

“It’s called el despertar--the great awakening,” she said.

De Garcia said the Republican Party must stop painting Latinos as outsiders and welcome them as an integral part of the electorate. “We need to reach out and promote our values and principles,” she said. “The Hispanic agenda is there.”

Still, many Latino Republicans remained true to the party. Imelda Preciado, for instance, is a Dornan volunteer who became a citizen four years ago. “He is a really honest man, and he works so hard for this country.”

In the end, however, the victorious Democrats may have benefited most from hard work and a consistent theme. Dunn, for instance, hammered at Hurtt for missing key votes in Sacramento.

“I read no grandiose message in this victory,” Dunn said. “This was about a challenger who said he was willing to work hard, and about a lawmaker who didn’t. If I don’t work hard in Sacramento, I suspect I’ll suffer the same fate as Rob Hurtt.”

Correa, meanwhile, hustled to the end. He put almost 800 workers in the field on election day. Those included hundreds of young Latinos, among them almost all 40 members of the Saddleback High School wrestling team.

“We had very good community support,” he said. “And we were right on the issues: health care, minimum wage, education, the need for more schools.”

Times staff writers Ray Herndon, Jean O. Pasco, Esther Schrader, Tini Tran and Janet Wilson contributed to this report.

* DORNAN DESERTERS: Support he had in years past vanished as minorities, Republicans swung to Sanchez. A14