The GOP’s shotgun wedding

REPUBLICANS AT the top of the ticket can’t win in California without capturing centrist Democratic and independent votes. That truth has never set well with GOP activists, which is why they’re bristling at Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s return to the political center after his reform initiatives were resoundingly defeated last November. Some activists even briefly called for the Republican Party to rescind its endorsement of Schwarzenegger at next weekend’s state GOP convention; others threaten they won’t go out to campaign for him in November.

“Why should we give our time to somebody who doesn’t share our beliefs?” party activist Steve Frank asked.

That puts Schwarzenegger in a bind. Although moderate Democrats and independent voters helped him to victory in the 2003 recall election, many have deserted him since then.

A January poll taken by San Jose State’s Survey and Policy Research Institute found that if the gubernatorial election were held today, the governor could count on only one-quarter of the independent vote against state Treasurer Phil Angelides and just 20% against state Controller Steve Westly.

Latino voters pose another problem for the governor.

The Latino share of the electorate has nearly doubled in the last 15 years, and as the number of Latino voters has increased, their support for Republican top-of-the-ticket candidates has declined.

In 2003, Schwarzenegger won 32% of the Latino vote against Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, the first major Latino gubernatorial candidate in California’s modern political history. But the governor’s brief flirtation with harsh antiimmigration rhetoric last year proved politically hazardous. In the San Jose State survey, he pulled less than 20% of the Latino vote against each of the two major Democratic challengers.

A recent Field Institute survey estimated that “unless Schwarzenegger is able to improve his standing with Latino voters in 2006, he must carry the non-Latino vote by at least 6 points to win reelection.”

So what is the governor to do?

He’s up against the arithmetic of modern California politics. Republicans are still the minority party. Statewide elections are more and more won in the middle. If the middle erodes, Schwarzenegger must gin up GOP turnout. And that means placating disgruntled conservatives who might simply stay home or desert the governor for a third-party candidate.

It’s too late for a viable alternative to challenge Schwarzenegger in the June primary, but November could be another story. For example, Jim Gilchrist, a decorated Vietnam War veteran and co-founder of the Minuteman Project, was the American Independent Party candidate in the special election to replace Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach). Gilchrist ran to the right of the GOP favorite, state Sen. John Campbell (R-Irvine), on such issues as illegal immigration, forcing a runoff in which Gilchrist garnered 25% of the vote.

And here’s another reason why Schwarzenegger can’t alienate the GOP -- money.

Proposition 34, which goes into effect this election cycle, caps individual contributions to a gubernatorial candidate at $22,300. Political parties face no such restrictions. They can funnel all the campaign money they have to a candidate.

The governor also needs the votes of Republican legislators to pass a budget and get his huge rebuilding program on the November ballot. Both require a two-thirds vote in the Legislature.

If California political history is a guide, most of the the GOP rank and file, despite its pouting, will stick with Schwarzenegger, if only to protect the party’s hold on his powerful office.

In 1982, conservative Republicans supported the pro-choice moderate Pete Wilson in the U.S. Senate race against then-Gov. Jerry Brown, a liberal Democrat, and Wilson won. And in 1990, GOP conservatives, fearing for their legislative fate in the upcoming reapportionment, put aside their disdain for Wilson and supported him for governor against Dianne Feinstein. Wilson ran virtually unopposed in the GOP primary and squeaked by Feinstein in November, helped by a Republican turnout fueled by party support for Proposition 140, the term-limits initiative.

Conservative radio talk-show host Inga Barks stated the case concisely: “Mostly what appeals to conservatives is that [Schwarzenegger is] the only guy who can win.”

Like it or not, Schwarzenegger and the right are stuck with each other.