Schipske Faces Key Hurdle in 38th District

The date that looms most urgently for Gerrie Schipske, the Democrat who is trying to unseat Rep. Steve Horn (R-Long Beach) is not Nov. 7, the day of the general election. It’s June 30.

That’s the close of the current campaign finance reporting period, and Schipske strategists figure that the Long Beach nurse practitioner and attorney needs to reach mid-race fund-raising goals by then to demonstrate her candidacy’s viability to national Democratic leaders.

“The numbers are ripe for a victory here,” Bud Jackson, Schipske’s Washington-area campaign consultant, said of the Long Beach-based 38th Congressional District, where Democrats hold a 20-point edge in registration over Republicans.

“The question is: Can we demonstrate that she is a credible candidate in terms of raising money?” Jackson added. “That is how people are looking at it in D.C.”

Specifically, Schipske needs to have raised between $150,000 and $200,000--and still have roughly $100,000 on hand--by month’s end. By March 31, the end of the last campaign finance reporting period, she had raised $89,000 but already had spent all but $11,000.

Having party leaders move her race onto their top target list would be a great boost. The national parties can contribute, in limited amounts, directly to a candidate’s campaign and can help in other important ways, too, including conducting get-out-the-vote drives and putting the word out to party activists, interest groups and contributors that a candidate deserves their support.

Schipske, 50, narrowly won the contentious, four-way Democratic primary in March, edging past Erin Gruwell, the award-winning high school teacher who had been recruited by national Democratic leaders.

Her victory earned her the opportunity to take on Horn, 68, the popular, politically moderate former president of Cal State Long Beach.

Despite the lopsided registration (currently 51% Democrats, 31% Republicans), Horn has won reelection every two years since 1992, when he upset the Democratic candidate in the then-newly drawn district. He has garnered support from the many conservative Democrats in the blue-collar and middle-class district, which in addition to much of Long Beach, includes Bellflower, Downey, Hawaiian Gardens, Lakewood, Paramount and Signal Hill. Horn has won even while the district has voted Democratic in other races--for President Clinton and for Gov. Gray Davis and Sen. Barbara Boxer in 1998.

This year, control of the House of Representatives is on the line. Democrats, who need to pick up six seats to regain the majority, are zeroing in on about 30 Republican-held seats across the country that they have identified as their best prospects. Four of them are in California: the 15th District in Northern California that Tom Campbell is giving up to run for U.S. Senate, Brian Bilbray’s 49th District in San Diego County, James E. Rogan’s Glendale-Pasadena-based 27th District and Steven T. Kuykendall’s 36th District, which runs along the coast from Venice to San Pedro.

Democrats say they are also keeping an eye on two other California GOP districts: Horn’s and Elton Gallegly’s 23rd District in Ventura County.

“It’s a winnable seat, and she has the right profile and a first-rate [campaign] organization,” John Del Cecato, spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said of Schipske, who has long been active in the district. She once came within 1,200 votes of defeating a Republican incumbent in the overlapping 54th Assembly District.

“We’re just watching to see how things develop” before deciding whether to pour resources into her race, he added.

So far at least, national Republican leaders do not perceive Schipske as a serious threat to Horn and therefore have not offered the kind of help they are expected to extend to Rogan and Kuykendall, both of whom face extremely strong challenges.

In addition to showing prowess in fund-raising, Schipske must demonstrate that she can rally key groups--including labor and Long Beach’s large and politically active gay and lesbian community--and can bring aboard local Democrats who are still unhappy about the divisive primary.

Jackson, her consultant, acknowledged that the campaign “has some work to do” in reaching out to other area Democrats but expressed confidence that “people will be with us. It will take some time, but they will be there.”

However, Allan Hoffenblum, a Republican political consultant whose nonpartisan California Target Book tracks congressional and legislative races, said Schipske appears to be having a hard time.

“She has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, and she is just not popular. That is why the [national] leaders wanted somebody else,” Hoffenblum said. On the other hand, if Democratic leaders think she can win the seat, they will back her wholeheartedly, he added.

Some local Democrats echoed this view, though they did not want to be quoted. Others said Schipske is well respected but that Horn’s own popularity is the bigger problem.

That factor apparently extends into the local gay and lesbian community, in which Schipske, a lesbian, has long been active.

Kevin Geary, president of the Long Beach Lambda Democratic Club, which has endorsed Schipske, said Horn is “basically a fairly moderate Republican [with a] good record” on gay rights issues.

“I can’t say the community is unified behind Gerrie, because Steve Horn isn’t really seen as a foe,” Geary said.

Horn waged a modest spring campaign and emerged with just over 50% of the total vote in the blanket, seven-way primary. (Libertarian Jack Neglia and Karen Blasdell-Wilkinson of the Natural Law party also are running.)

Horn supports abortion-choice rights and health care reforms and has pressed for campaign finance reform. Locally, he helped secure funding for the Alameda Corridor, a massive rail and truck tollway that will connect the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach to switching yards in Los Angeles, and secured funding to save the McDonnell Douglas/Boeing C-17 fighter jet program.

Horn recently broke party ranks and voted against normalizing trade relations with China. He cited human rights problems in China as the reason for his opposition, a view shared by Schipske. His vote pleased organized labor, which lobbied hard against the trade bill but lost in the House.

He takes every reelection challenge seriously, but so far, says his son and campaign manager, Steve Horn Jr., “I have not seen anything to make me more worried than I was in any of the previous campaigns.

“We believe his support has continued to grow. . . . I see no reason for voters to give us a different outcome this year,” Horn Jr. said.

One potentially key factor in the race is how much organized labor decides to do on Schipske’s behalf. She has the endorsement of the county’s largest and most potent labor arm, the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO. She works for one of its affiliates as a health care advisor.

Federation chief Miguel Contreras said its top election priorities now are Rogan’s and Kuykendall’s districts. But, noting that the federation has more union members in Horn’s district--about 50,000--than in each of the other two districts, Contreras said its leaders are considering whether to add Horn’s district to their list.

“Where we put our resources is still being determined,” Contreras said.

House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) has asked the federation to “be active” for Schipske, Contreras said, “but we need for him to tell everybody this is a top race before we jump.” He expects a final decision to be made around the time the Democrats hold their national convention in Los Angeles in August.

Horn’s son predicted that some unions will endorse Horn and that many people in unions that support Schipske still will cast their ballots for him.

Meanwhile, Schipske, whose platform includes gun control, health care reform and education, is doing all she can to get party leaders to add her race to their top target list.

She spent part of last week in Washington, meeting with Democratic House members and leaders and working on fund-raising. On Thursday, the national AFL-CIO hosted a breakfast in her honor.

Schipske consultant Jackson said she is certain to meet her month-end fund-raising goal. Horn had added $221,000 to the nearly $203,000 he had started with and $333,000 left on hand, reports showed.

Nonetheless, Horn, who does not accept money from political action committees, expects “to be substantially out-raised and outspent,” his son said.

“That has happened before,” Horn Jr. said, citing the 1996 race, in which Democratic attorney Rick Zbur spent $1 million to Horn’s $454,000. Zbur, who had moved into the district to run, lost 53% to 43%.