This Senate Seat’s a Rarity: Up for Grabs

In an age when safely engineered elective districts have taken the high drama out of political contests, a state Senate race in central Orange County bucks the trend.

Two Santa Ana Democrats -- Assemblyman Tom Umberg and county Supervisor Lou Correa -- want their party’s nomination for the 34th Senate District in the June 6 primary.

Republican voters will choose between Assemblywoman Lynn Daucher of Brea and anti-illegal-immigration activist Lupe Moreno of Santa Ana.

The district comprises most of Santa Ana, Anaheim, Buena Park and Garden Grove; portions of Fullerton and Westminster; and all of Stanton. It is represented by Joe Dunn, a Democrat who took the seat from Republican Rob Hurtt in 1998 and is now running for state controller.

California Republicans want the seat back. Democrats aren’t about to give it up, at least not without a serious fight.

“This is the hot race,” said Adam Probolsky, a Republican pollster in Costa Mesa.

The high-stakes race has attracted money and attention from party leaders in Sacramento because it is one of only a few truly competitive Senate districts in the state. Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by about 3,300 voters in the district, whose total registration is about 279,000.

So far, Correa has drawn the most independent money, with nearly $450,000 spent on his behalf in May by three political action committees funded by such interests as insurance and mortgage companies, Indian tribes, medical groups and energy companies. Umberg, by contrast, hadn’t benefited from any such spending on his behalf.

But, in campaign reports filed last week, Umberg raised more than twice as much as Correa in direct contributions: $506,000 to Correa’s $214,000.

Umberg has tried to blunt the effect of the independent efforts by waging an aggressive door-to-door campaign. He said he began talking to the district’s frequent voters in November to gather momentum.

The former federal prosecutor has more at stake than Correa, who would continue as a county supervisor if he loses the primary.

Should Umberg lose, he would have to make the jump back to private life, something he’s done before. A former deputy U.S. attorney and longtime political activist, he served two terms in the Assembly, from 1990 to 1994, leaving to make unsuccessful statewide runs for attorney general and insurance commissioner. He served as California campaign manager for President Clinton in 1996 and was a deputy drug czar in Washington.

“I’ve represented most of the district before, and I understand what people in the district want done in Sacramento,” he said.

But some have accused Umberg of representing a district where he doesn’t live, noting his family’s home in Villa Park. Umberg rents a condo in Santa Ana, which would officially meet the requirement.

Two brochures sent to voters early in the campaign by an independent group also faulted Umberg for the four-year extramarital affair he admitted last year and for how his campaign characterized his service in the U.S. Army Reserves. Critics accused Umberg’s campaign of saying he was prosecuting terrorist suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, whereas he spent most of his time in Washington, D.C. Umberg said he was a member of the legal team prosecuting terrorist suspects and that he had never said he’d spend all of his time in Cuba.

Umberg said he had concentrated on consumer and crime victim protection in the Assembly and wrote a bill that toughened hate crime laws in California. He also wrote successful legislation protecting seniors in nursing home facilities and gun safety laws. He supports abortion rights.

He also is the only Democrat in the Legislature to earn a 100% rating from the California Taxpayers Assn., a testament to the conservatism of his central county district. Correa, who spent six years in the Assembly and was termed out in 2004, had a record of generally favoring tax-increase proposals.

On some hot-button issues, the two candidates diverge: Umberg supports legislation allowing homosexuals to marry; Correa has opposed it. Umberg has voted against allowing illegal immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses; Correa supported that legislation.

Correa, after being termed out of the Assembly, won a supervisorial seat with considerable support from county employee unions, which weren’t happy this year when he declared his intent to challenge Umberg. Union and party leaders said they didn’t want to waste their investment in Correa for the county post.

Correa said he was asked to consider a campaign because, as someone who grew up in the district, he had a better grasp of what mattered to residents there. But the decision to do so was his, he said, and came after he realized that he could do more for the county in Sacramento than as the lone Democrat on the GOP-dominated Board of Supervisors.

“There are important issues being taken up in education, infrastructure and public safety,” he said. “You really have to have an advocate fighting at the state level to bring back those taxpayer dollars, and I think I can be that advocate.”

Correa has been helped by independent efforts funded by many of the same donors who have given money to Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata (D-Oakland). Perata encouraged Correa to take on Umberg, fearful that the assemblyman’s past affair would hurt his chances with voters.

Perata’s involvement led Umberg to file a complaint with the state’s political watchdog agency accusing Perata of essentially running Correa’s campaign, a charge Perata and Correa deny. Yet Correa hadn’t spent much money on his campaign, with most of his funds staying put in his supervisorial bank account.

Republicans have kept a close eye on the race, banking that Daucher will emerge as the GOP nominee to take on whoever survives the Democratic primary. Daucher has already begun mailing campaign information to Democrats hoping to boost her recognition among those voters.

Moreno said she decided to run to give Republicans an alternative to Daucher in the primary and to promote her view that illegal immigration is hurting California. She said Daucher was too liberal for the district, citing her support for abortion rights and a vote to allow the children of illegal immigrants to pay in-state college fees.

Moreno has run a grass-roots campaign, relying on volunteers, since she has only a sliver of the $400,000 raised by Daucher.

Daucher has the backing of Senate Minority Leader Dick Ackerman of Irvine, support that angered party conservatives who preferred someone other than the more moderate assemblywoman. But Ackerman argued that Daucher was a better fit for the district because of her support for education and state budget reforms.