Simon Battles Storm

Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill Simon Jr. struggled Wednesday to contain the damage from his repudiation of his campaign’s response to questions on gay rights, saying he would “try to reach out to all Californians.”

On a campaign swing through San Francisco and San Jose, Simon was swamped with scores of questions on gay rights. Even supporters voiced dismay at the latest self-imposed distraction for a campaign already in turmoil over staff shakeups, a fraud verdict against Simon’s investment firm and other troubles.

Lee Rodgers, host of a conservative San Francisco radio show, told morning rush-hour listeners that Simon, his guest Wednesday on KSFO-AM, needed to “explain this latest mess he’s gotten himself into.”

“Let’s get right to it,” he told Simon. “What did you say? What did you sign? What do you mean on this whole gay rights thing that’s blowing up all over the place in the media today?”

“Lee, I haven’t changed my position in the slightest,” Simon replied.

“Are you saying that somebody sandbagged you or what?” Rodgers asked.

“I think sometimes positions get distorted,” Simon said.

Simon acknowledged that his campaign had sent a completed questionnaire to a gay rights group with his signature at the bottom, but denied that he read, approved or signed it. The biggest problem with the unauthorized response by his top advisors, Simon said, was a pledge that he would sign a Gay Pride Day proclamation as governor.

Over and over during his morning visit to San Francisco--home to one of the world’s most visible and politically influential gay communities--Simon was pressed to explain his rationale. “Obviously, they are free to do what they want,” Simon said on another San Francisco radio show. “Any group can get together and have a celebration if they wish to, but to have the state recognize it with a proclamation--no, I wouldn’t support that.”

Simon declined repeatedly to say why.

The Simon campaign’s response last month to 24 questions from the gay rights group, Log Cabin Republicans of California, outraged some conservatives, who accused the candidate of duping them into supporting him. The Rev. Lou Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition and other conservatives welcomed Simon’s Tuesday disavowal of the signed questionnaire, but the candidate said their complaints had nothing to do with his repudiation of the response.

To some political analysts, Simon’s troubles on gay rights seemed emblematic of a stumbling campaign that has failed to set the agenda in the governor’s race.

“He’s got a bunch of incompetents running his campaign,” said Dick Dresner, a GOP pollster who worked for former Gov. Pete Wilson. “On something this important, you shouldn’t be making those kinds of mistakes.”

Dresner said it was absurd that Simon was “trying to solidify his base on the right” at a time when he must court Democrats and independents.

Sal Russo, Simon’s chief strategist, took the blame for the Log Cabin mishap, saying that he failed to ask the candidate to review the questionnaire.

“It never got past me,” Russo said.

Russo said he glanced at it quickly and approved the use of Simon’s signature, which is stored on a campaign computer system. He said there was no formal list of people who had permission to use Simon’s signature.

“Everybody kind of knows what their authority is,” he said.

Ron Rogers, a senior Simon advisor and former manager of the campaign, supervised the response to the Log Cabin questions. In an Aug. 9 e-mail, he sent a draft response to Log Cabin member Don Genhart of Palm Springs.

“I have to get this version to Bill now,” Rogers wrote. “Please review and let me know if you have any MAJOR objections. Again, please do not share with anyone else.”

Rogers declined to comment on whether he gave the draft response to Simon. But Russo said Rogers did not.

Genhart, who also is the Simon campaign’s regional director for San Bernardino and Riverside counties, said he was sticking with Simon, but “the radical religious fanatical right has sort of entered this thing.”

“I feel there’s been some deception, not by Bill Simon, but maybe by some people in our campaign,” Genhart said.

For Simon, the gay rights controversy made it difficult to draw attention Wednesday to his efforts to focus on schools, tax cuts and questions about the ethical standards of his Democratic rival, Gov. Gray Davis. A banner headline at the top of the San Francisco Chronicle’s front page blared: “Simon backs off on gay rights; GOP candidate for governor recants under pressure from religious right.”

On a visit to a San Francisco elementary school, Simon told reporters that gay people work for his campaign, though he did not specify who they were or what positions they held. And after a speech at a Rotary Club luncheon in San Jose, he said he had not “flip-flopped” on gay rights.

On a KGO-AM radio show in San Francisco, host Ronn Owens told Simon that he seemed like “a guy who just doesn’t like gays” or who is “surrounded by people who don’t like gays” and would do nothing to foster acceptance of gay Californians.

“Well, that’s just not true, Ronn,” Simon said. “The fact is that I met with a group of gay people in the beginning of August. We had a good meeting. We had a good dialogue.”

Simon declined to name any of the people with whom he met.

Simon told Owens that he would “work to find the common ground,” but the host responded, “This comes off so right wing, it’s scary.”

“Ronn,” Simon said, “I just think we have to continue the dialogue, and when you talk about terms like centrist and right wing, you know, I want to talk about things like jobs, taxes and schools.

“We’ve got 2 millions kids trapped in failing schools, and people are focused on a questionnaire,” Simon told another interviewer on KFOG, a San Francisco FM station. “It’s so silly.”