Democrats rally the faithful as fall campaign gets underway

California’s Democratic candidates marked the start of the fall campaign Monday in the embrace of their most committed supporters — hundreds of union workers who gathered at rallies across the state to pledge thousands of hours of calls to voters over the eight weeks before election day.

After a breakfast of scrambled eggs and bacon served by apron-clad candidates in downtown Los Angeles, union leaders launched a series of caustic attacks against Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman’s wealth and policy proposals, which include shrinking the state workforce by 40,000 jobs.

Officials kicked off the program by handing “golden hatchets” to actors dressed up as Republican Senate candidate Carly Fiorina, who is challenging three-term Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, and former EBay chief Whitman, who is running against Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown.

“If we do our job right we are going to drive Meg Whitman so far out of politics that she will have spent all of her money — and after the election don’t be surprised if we see her in an apron asking people if they want fries with their burger,” said Maria Elena Durazo, executive secretary-treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor. “Today is the beginning of the fight, the beginning of the resistance to Meg Whitman’s unprecedented attempt to buy the governorship of California.”

The gathering at the conference center of the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, and later events in Sacramento and Oakland, highlighted the critical role labor will play in the governor’s race. Unions have served as a powerful counterweight to Whitman’s wealth, spending at least $14 million over the summer to keep Democratic nominee Brown competitive against his billionaire rival, who has put $104 million of her own money into her effort.

In a year when turnout is expected to be low and the candidates fear that Democratic voters are less enthusiastic than Republicans, the Democratic ticket is counting on the unions to serve as its foot-soldiers in getting voters to cast ballots.

Brown, who unveiled his first television ad Monday, described the race as a match-up between an effort driven by volunteers and a campaign with a deep bench of highly paid consultants and “mind-boggling” spending.

“I don’t have a 100 people scripting me; I’m not an advertisement. I’m a real person who’s lived in this state all my life,” Brown told the rowdy Labor Day audience in Los Angeles. (He will, however, be spending tens of millions in his own campaign.)

At Land Park in Sacramento, Brown said that though there were “warts” on his record, he had earned the goodwill of voters.

“You can’t buy the confidence or trust of people,” he said.

Whitman had no public events Monday. Her spokeswoman, Andrea Jones Rivera, said the Democratic event in Los Angeles was evidence that Brown’s campaign is being propped up by labor. “Brown has outsourced his campaign to the government unions, and if he’s elected, they’ll get exactly what they want,” she said.

Brown’s new 30-second spot, which will begin airing statewide Tuesday, aims to introduce him to voters unfamiliar with his resume, which includes two terms as governor from 1975-83 as well as stints as mayor of Oakland and attorney general. Brown vowed in the ad to make government live within its means, return power to the local level and oppose new taxes without voter approval.

Jones Rivera called the ad “a misleading historic renovation of his own record.” Whitman last week began airing her sixth attack ad against Brown, criticizing his record as governor.

The candidates’ ads contain no outright lies, but both lack context. For example, Whitman accurately says that Brown opposed Proposition 13, but she fails to mention that once the ballot measure to limit increases on property taxes passed, Brown so enthusiastically implemented it that the measure’s co-sponsor, Howard Jarvis, endorsed his reelection bid months later. She also notes that the unemployment rate nearly doubled to 11% during his tenure but fails to say that occurred as the nation was gripped by recession and facing widespread joblessness.

Brown boasts of creating 1.9 million jobs and maintaining world-class schools and universities, also true. But the state was facing financial crises when he left office, and the candidate was viewed at the time as having little interest in education.

Boxer hopes the unions’ spending in the race for governor will also turn out voters who support her in her contest with Fiorina.

The Democratic incumbent attacked both Whitman and Fiorina as out-of-touch businesswomen trying to buy their way into office.

“California is not for sale,” she declared in Oakland.

In Los Angeles, Boxer attacked the former Hewlett-Packard chief executive for cutting jobs and moving U.S. jobs overseas.

“She was proud as she stamped ‘Made in China’ on her products,” Boxer said. “Well let me tell you what I’m about — I want to see the words ‘Made in America’ again.”

Fiorina, who was traveling in Israel over the Labor Day weekend, has defended her record at Hewlett Packard by saying that she was forced to make “tough choices” to keep the company profitable in the midst of the dot-com bust.

“Barbara Boxer’s failed economic policies are so ineffective she can’t even save the jobs of her biggest supporters: big labor,” Fiorina’s spokeswoman, Andrea Saul, said. “With California unemployment at a staggering 12.3% and Boxer’s own beloved rank-and-file union workers losing their jobs, it seems her promised ‘help and hope’ took the day off today too.”

maeve.reston@latimes.com

seema.mehta@latimes.com

Times staff writers Shane Goldmacher and Evan Halper contributed to this report.