Dannemeyer Releases Tax Returns in Senate Bid : Politics: Seymour, his primary opponent, reverses his position and says he will do the same.

Stoking the heat under his Republican primary opponent in next year’s race for a U.S. Senate seat, U.S. Rep. William E. Dannemeyer released copies of his tax returns Monday and pointedly challenged Sen. John Seymour to do the same.

Dannemeyer, a conservative from Fullerton who is engaged in an uphill battle to unseat Seymour, a moderate from Anaheim, said he was releasing his returns since 1979 because “people have a right to judge for themselves if the person who wants to represent them . . . can manage their own affairs.”

Within hours, Seymour, who has steadfastly refused to release his tax returns, said through a spokesman that he would make the documents public by Labor Day.

“He wants to sit down with his tax accountant to make sure there aren’t discrepancies and ambiguities,” said H. D. Palmer, Seymour’s spokesman in Washington.

The commitment marked a reversal by Seymour, who was picked by Gov. Pete Wilson in January to fill Wilson’s unexpired Senate term. Seymour has repeatedly declined requests for the information, despite press reports casting doubt on claims about his personal wealth.

A Times investigation published last month showed that the former Orange County real estate broker was not a millionaire at 30, as Wilson claimed in making the appointment, and may not be one now.

Dannemeyer said he was unaware that Seymour had declined to give out the returns. But his challenge was clearly meant to force the senator to acknowledge Dannemeyer’s presence in the race.

Until now, Seymour has publicly all but ignored Dannemeyer, focusing his most biting comments on former Democratic gubernatorial nominee Dianne Feinstein, who so far is the only Democrat running against Seymour.

Seymour’s previous attempts to keep his financial forms private also played into his general election strategy. Pressed about releasing them during a Times interview in April, he said he would make the documents public after “we get by the primary.” Then, he said, he would do so only if Feinstein released her returns.

“He is not going to get away with trying to live with the fiction that he’s not opposed in this (primary) race,” Dannemeyer, in a telephone interview, said of Seymour.

The documents released Monday showed that Dannemeyer and his wife, Evelyn, paid nearly $151,000 in federal taxes and $35,212 in state taxes in 1990, out of an income of $551,937.

Only $95,417 of Dannemeyer’s income came from his congressional salary, while $117,291 was derived from investments and $325,833 from the termination and disbursement of a profit-sharing retirement plan he had with his former law practice.

Since 1986, the tax returns showed, Dannemeyer and his wife have made more from their investments than from his salary. Dannemeyer said that almost all of his investments, which include a Fullerton apartment building, an office building and industrial property, were purchased before he was elected to Congress in 1978.

The exceptions, he said, were an interest in a residential duplex shared by one of his children and a property he received in trade after a partner bought out one of his industrial parcels.

The returns also show that the Dannemeyers paid $54,092 in taxes on $209,246 in 1989; $43,980 in taxes on $181,955 in 1988; and $56,221 in taxes on $189,015 in 1988. The earliest returns, for 1979, show Dannemeyer paid $4,898 in taxes on $50,737 in income.

Dannemeyer estimated his net worth at between $2 million and $3 million.

The release of tax returns has become commonplace in statewide campaigns. In 1990, all major candidates for governor released their returns.

Feinstein was by far the richest, having earned with her husband, investment banker Richard C. Blum, almost $7.4 million in 1989. Altogether, Feinstein released 18 years of tax returns.

Feinstein’s Senate campaign manager, Kam Kuwata, said the Democrat would release her 1990 tax returns for review.