In Six Races, One True Contest

Membership has its privileges for Orange County’s congressional delegation.

Of the five incumbents, two are running unopposed for their party’s nomination and three face token challenges in Tuesday’s primary.

Only the decidedly nasty GOP slugfest over who will replace retiring Rep. Ron Packard (R-Oceanside) has kept the election from being a complete yawner.

The county’s other three Republican incumbents--Ed Royce of Fullerton, Gary Miller of Diamond Bar and Dana Rohrabacher of Huntington Beach--should have no problem nabbing their party’s nomination, or winning reelection in November, said Jack Pitney, a political scientist at Claremont College who lives in Orange County.

“We’re in a political holding pattern,” he said.

More credible Democratic challengers may have decided to sit out the 2000 campaign, choosing to wait until 2002 when the boundaries of California’s congressional districts will be redrawn, Pitney said.

The Orange County delegation’s only Democrat, Loretta Sanchez of Garden Grove, is unopposed in Tuesday’s party primary. However, the two-term representative said she expects a serious challenge in November’s general election from her top Republican opponent, Gloria Matta Tuchman.

“I’m treating it as if it’s going to be the hardest race in my life,” said Sanchez, who has never closed her campaign office since she launched the first of what became back-to-back victories over Republican Robert K. Dornan, whose seat she won.

Tuchman, a Santa Ana schoolteacher, in 1998 ran unsuccessfully for state superintendent of public instruction and was one of the leading proponents of Proposition 227, the anti-bilingual education initiative approved by state voters two years ago.

Her challenger in the GOP primary is retired Anaheim Hills optometrist Howard Garber, the host of a conservative public-access cable television program.

Garber was an unsuccessful state Assembly candidate in 1992, but hit the national spotlight in 1997 when he arranged to have his dead daughter’s fertilized embryos implanted in a surrogate mother.

Unlike Tuchman, Garber says he’s a “pro-choice Republican.” But stopping illegal immigration, and curtailing legal immigration, is the top issue in his campaign. Garber said the county, and nation, have been overwhelmed by Latino and black immigrants.

“I think we’re headed to a demographic catastrophe in California. We’re becoming a minority state,” Garber said. “It’s the Third World types who are exploding in number. They are impoverished, and they perpetuate their poverty and our plight.”

Tuchman called Garber’s comments seriously misguided: “We live in a democracy, not a Third World country. That doesn’t seem like much of a democracy.”

Improving the nation’s schools tops Tuchman’s list of political objectives. She supports granting vouchers for students in poorly performing public schools, and strong local control over education.

Tuchman said she expects her support of Prop. 227 to draw strong backing from the district’s Latinos, who make up nearly 50% of the population. Sanchez said she expects the opposite to occur.

Also running for the seat are civil engineer Larry Engwall, who is the Natural Law Party candidate and Libertarian Richard B. Boddie, a teacher.

To the west, four relatively unknown and poorly funded Democrats are vying for the honor to take on Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach), who has represented the most Republican district in California since 1988.

UCI economics professor John Graham said he decided to run for the Democratic nomination because he feels Cox’s “right-wing politics” no longer represent the district. Graham, an international finance expect, also criticized Cox’s hard-line politics against China, saying it was curtailing trade and harming Orange County’s high-tech firms.

The other Democrats in the race are Don Irvine, a retired police lieutenant, businessman Jim Keysor and business litigator Maziar Mafi.

Independents vying for the seat are the Natural Law Party’s Iris Adam, a business manager, and Libertarian David F. Nolan, an author and inventor.

Here’s the breakdown on the races in the other districts:

* 45th District: Incumbent Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) faces GOP challenger Long K. Pham, a mechanical engineer from Newport Beach. Pham ran against Rohrabacher in 1998 and received only 8% of the vote in the primary. The winner faces Democrat Ted Crissel of Costa Mesa, a property development consultant who is running unopposed for the nomination. Don Hull, a small business owner is running for the Libertarian party and Realtor Constance Betton is on the Natural Law Party slate.

* 41st District: Freshman Rep. Gary G. Miller is being challenged by Anthony “Tony” Ma of Yorba Linda. Ma, a retired Caltrans engineer, has funded his campaign with less than $5,000 of his own money. Miller, former mayor of Diamond Bar, had $200,888 in his campaign account as of Feb. 16, federal elections records show. The winner will face Democrat Rodolfo G. “Rudy” Favila in November. Favila, a former Ontario city councilman once fined by the state for campaign violations, is running unopposed. Also in the race is Natural Law party candidate David Kramer, a golf course manager.

* 39th District: Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) is running unopposed for the GOP nomination. Democrat Gill G. Kanel also is running unopposed. Kanel owns an Anaheim-based machine shop that specializes in aerospace contracts. Independents running for that seat are Libertarian Keith D. Gann, an engineer and Natural Law’s Ron Jevning, a researcher and teacher.

The campaign for Packard’s heavily Republican district, which includes south Orange County, has been marred by accusations dishonesty and political hucksterism lobbed between the two front-runners: state Sen. Bill Morrow (R-Oceanside) and businessman and failed U.S. Senate candidate Darrell Issa of Vista.

Valley Center attorney Kevin H. Mahan, one of the other eight Republicans running for the 48th Congressional District seat, called Morrow and Issa “spoiled little children” and said they’ve fouled the air of the whole campaign.

“They’re certainly not acting like congressmen,” said Mahan, whose other GOP opponents include Mark Dornan, son of the former congressman.

The other Republican contenders are: Kim Debow, 39, of Oceanside, a defense researcher for a management consulting firm; William D. Griffith, a mathematics teacher in Carlsbad who attended West Point; James Luke, 48, a roofing contractor and former deputy sheriff from Temecula; Ed Mayerhofer, 35, an electrician from Laguna Niguel; Joe Snyder, 55, a retired Marine colonel; and Dr. Don Udall, 62, of Newport Beach, a urologist.

Despite being one of the state’s most Republican districts, two Democrats are running to replace the retiring Packard: former Marine Capt. Peter Kouvelis, 33, of Dana Point and Dana Point mortgage broker Richard K. Maguire. Kouvelis has been endorsed by the California Democratic Party.

Also on the ballot are the Reform Party’s Eddie Rose, 61, an engineer; Libertarian Joe Michael Cobb, 56, a personal financial consultant; and Natural Law’s Sharon K. Miles, 47, a business owner.