State Republican party chair visits South County
San Martin – Republican royalty visited South County this week to spread Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s message of fiscal responsibility and shore up support for the governor among the party’s more conservative members.
“We’re losing independents and the Democrats are very motivated right now,” California Republican Party Chairman Duf Sundheim said Wednesday night, at a gathering of the Gilroy-Morgan Hill chapter of the California Republican Assembly. “We have to change our image and broaden our image of who we are. Too much of our dialogue is internal.”
Sundheim’s visit, on the eve of Schwarzenegger’s State of the State Address, comes at a crucial time for the party and the governor, who faces reelection in November and is under increasing scrutiny from conservatives for what they see as a dramatic shift to the left after the failure of last November’s special election.
In recent weeks, Schwarzenegger hired Democrat Susan Kennedy to be his chief of staff, promised more money to public schools and supported a $1 hike in the state’s minimum wage.
“The Susan Kennedy thing, I almost fell over when he did that,” said Gilroy resident and CRA member Doug Wilber. “I like a lot of what he’s doing and I like his personality. I do want to see him be more conservative.”
Sundheim said Wednesday that Schwarzenegger doesn’t fit the traditional Republican mode, but is committed to the party’s core values of fiscal and social conservatism. He said party polling revealed broad support for a boost in the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour and the increase will not be fought by business interests.
“We’re like a family, we’re going to have disagreements,” Sundheim said. “I think he’s a great man and great men are hard to understand. We were told he was going to be unorthodox, that he was going to do things differently. In his mind, this isn’t a shift to the left.”
And Sundheim added a twist to the oft-made comparison of Schwarzenegger with Ronald Reagan, another Hollywood star who brought a populist Republicanism to Sacramento. Sundheim invoked the conservative icon throughout his 75-minute give and take with the CRA, though he said it wasn’t a conscious effort to ease their fears about the more moderate governor.
“It’s more the fact that I’m reading a lot of books about Reagan,” Sundheim said in an interview. “I’m personally inspired by Reagan and how he was able to put together the coalition he put together.”
One of Reagan’s biggest accomplishments on his path to the White House was winning the support of labor unions, a population that mobilized against the governor last year and helped defeat each of the eight propositions on the special election ballot.
One of those measures would have limited the influence of unions in political campaigns. Sundheim said the biggest immediate challenge for Republicans is to convince union members that Republican plans for the state’s economic health serve the best interests of labor.
“Reagan was able to get unions to buy into the bigger picture,” he said, adding that Democrats hid behind nurses and teachers during the special election to avoid talking about the state’s economic malaise. “We never got to the issues.”
Morgan Hill resident Dave Roche said the Schwarzenegger-Reagan connection is a natural one and that he was glad to get an insider’s perspective on the issues roiling Sacramento.
“It’s very interesting to get some direct, first-person insight into what the governor is thinking and the path he’s trying to take California on,” Roche said. “In the broader perspective, I think we’re going in the right direction. Hopefully, we will look back at Arnold and think that he’s been as successful as Ronald Reagan.”
Most of the criticism directed at Sundheim during the event was for the governor’s inaction on illegal immigration, an issue that has divided Republicans locally and nationally. Attendees said they would rather pay more for produce than host Mexican immigrant whom they believe drain the state’s coffers.
Gilroy resident Frank Aguirre said he wants to see a ballot measure for the establishment of state border patrol.
“You say they’ll just come in through Arizona,” Aguirre said, “but the tougher we make it, they may think twice before they come back again.”
Sundheim said lighter measures such as tougher penalties for human traffickers and businesses that hire illegal workers have appeal among voters. His goal is to field a slate of minority candidates with unimpeachable credentials on immigration.
“I’m trying to recruit candidates,” he said. “We need to have that voice and it needs to come from somebody who doesn’t look like a racist.”
Sundheim also discussed the 2008 presidential election and the prospects of a Republican candidate carrying California for the first time since George Bush edged Michael Dukakis in 1988.
“We’ve made tremendous headway, but can we get 51 percent and be true to our Republican issues?” he said, adding that he’s reaching out to potential candidates Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts and U.S. Sen. George Allen of Virginia. “I’m trying to develop a national ticket in ’08 that will play in California.”
