A short campaign long on assistance

Candidates hoping to fill the vacant seat on the Orange County Board of Supervisors are beginning their final dash as the last week of the campaign approaches.

But some of the hardest sprinting in this truncated Feb. 6 special election has been done by campaign committees that are not allowed to have contact with the candidates.

Public employee unions, the county Democratic and Republican parties, and groups of somewhat murky origins have played a prominent role in advocating for -- and against -- candidates. Known as independent expenditure committees, these organizations can campaign for candidates but can not communicate with them.

Independent campaigns have taken on a more important role in recent years as more stringent state campaign finance laws have capped donations to candidates. But rarely have they taken such a high-profile role as in Orange County’s 1st Supervisorial District race. The most anyone can give to a candidate in this race is $1,500.

“The [committees] are running the bulk of the campaign that voters are seeing,” said Robert M. Stern, president of the Center for Governmental Studies, a political reform organization. “It’s fairly unusual.”

Independent expenditure committees help candidates by supporting them financially, but they can also hurt candidates if their work is off-message. They can also frustrate voters who wonder who is behind them.

The race to fill the seat vacated in November by Lou Correa, a Democrat who was elected to the state Senate, has been anything but average. The district includes Santa Ana, Westminster and Garden Grove, an area where Democrats have made inroads in recent years. Republicans have about one-quarter of a percentage point edge in registered voters.

With a campaign of just six weeks, candidates have had little time to assemble a campaign staff, raise contributions, hold debates or meet many residents in the district. Much of the campaigning has been done through the mailbox, as district voters have received stacks of campaign mailers. A candidate forum sponsored by the League of Women Voters is scheduled for Wednesday.

Campaign finance filings last week show the difficulty of funding a competitive race in such a short time. Democrat Tom Umberg, a former assemblyman widely regarded as the front-runner, raised $143,000 in recent weeks. The next-best fundraiser in that period was Santa Ana City Councilman Carlos Bustamante, who received half as much.

Garden Grove City Councilwoman Janet Nguyen is mainly relying on more than $200,000 she raised in previous runs for office. Trung Nguyen, a Garden Grove school board member, has relied on $100,000 he lent himself.

Umberg has been the biggest beneficiary of the independent campaign committees. A campaign run by the deputies union, the Assn. of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs, has sent out at least eight mailers on his behalf -- more than the Umberg campaign itself -- portraying him as “the choice” of law enforcement. Other county employee unions and the local Democratic Party have also sent out mailers supporting him.

“Groups are trying to make their mark with this race, and Umberg is benefiting from it,” said George Urch, Umberg’s campaign manager. “They all want to show they’re a force to be reckoned with, and they’re using our race to make a statement.”

It is easy to see why. The deputies union is locked in bitter negotiations with the Board of Supervisors over its labor contract, and badly needs an ally. And the local Democratic Party wants to prove it can keep the beachhead it established in Republican-dominated Orange County; the supervisorial district is similar to the area represented by Democratic Rep. Loretta Sanchez.

The assistance to Umberg’s campaign does not sit well with campaign-finance watchdogs, who question if his campaign is letting outside organizations do the hard work and what favors they will expect if he is elected. Shirley Grindle, who wrote the county’s campaign finance law, called the situation “grossly inappropriate.”

She said this was the first time she had seen an independent committee campaign more than the candidate. “If Umberg wants office so bad, he ought to get out there and work for it the way the rest of the candidates do,” she said. “If he gets elected, it’s thanks to somebody else’s effort, not his own.”

But if Umberg’s campaign has gotten help from independent committees, he has also been the biggest target of others.

The local Republican Party sent out mailers criticizing him, one noting his vote in the Assembly in support of same-sex marriage and another calling him “too liberal for Orange County.”

The Orange County Veterans & Military Families spent $8,500 on two anti-Umberg mailers. One quoted his wife, Robin, calling him a “compulsive liar,” the comment made in an e-mail quoted in a newspaper article about Umberg’s extramarital affair. Little is known about the organization: Phone calls go to an answering machine for a campaign services company; a reporter’s calls were not returned.

Trung Nguyen has also benefited from an independent expenditure committee: Viet PAC sent out a mailer that touted him as a (“respected leader”) and denigrated candidate Janet Nguyen (“wannabe politician”).

The Orange County Public Safety committee spent $17,000 for mailers in support of Bustamante, who has emerged as the leading contender among the Republican candidates. The piece said Bustamante is “working to make our homes and families safer.”

The mailer did not say which law enforcement officials or unions were part of the committee; Umberg has received endorsements from 34 public safety groups. The Public Safety organization shares the same telephone number as the veterans organization.

Former Santa Ana City Councilman Brett Franklin, another candidate, has not benefited from independent expenditures and calls all the spending “overkill.” He said he prefers going door to door and shaking hands.

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christian.berthelsen@latimes.com