Democrats Use All Their Weapons to Try to Unseat Horn

The C-17 cargo jet, the shining symbol of the revived economic fortunes of the McDonnell Douglas plant in Long Beach, looms large over the reelection campaign of Rep. Steve Horn, a two-term Republican congressman whom Democrats are trying hard to defeat in an effort to retake the House.

Horn’s 38th Congressional District, which includes Long Beach, San Pedro, Lakewood, Downey and other communities in southeast Los Angeles County, has become a prime target for Democrats, who are putting major party support behind Rick Zbur, an environmental attorney for the Los Angeles law firm of Latham & Watkins. Democrats like the district because they hold a 50% to 35% edge in voter registration.

McDonnell Douglas, which manufactures the C-17 and whose roots in Long Beach go back to the “Rosie the Riveter” days of World War II, is close to the spiritual and geographic center of the district.

Although its work force today is roughly half the 40,000 who worked at the plant in 1990, McDonnell Douglas has been the biggest employer in the district and thus a prime hunting ground for Democrats, who know that to win they need a big assist from the unions at the aircraft plant.

So far, Democrats have brought in Jesse Jackson, Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (R-Mo.) for McDonnell Douglas rallies designed in part to pump up support for Zbur. During a visit to Long Beach by President Clinton this summer, Zbur was invited to share the speaker’s platform. The administration has also sent Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt to campaign for Zbur.

Aircraft workers acknowledge that Horn has been supportive of the C-17, which employs about 9,000, but they say the lawmaker’s unwavering support of House Speaker Newt Gingrich and the Republican agenda overrides everything else.

“Steve Horn has supported the C-17 and we thank him for that,” said Al Austin, 28, a $21.80-an-hour aircraft worker and member of the United Auto Workers union, which has 7,600 members at McDonnell Douglas, “but in Congress he has voted against labor and with Gingrich most of the time.”

The local has endorsed Zbur, but only about 60 supporters showed up at a rally at the UAW union hall to hear Gephardt and Rangel.

In Horn, a tweedy former president of Cal State Long Beach, Democrats have a formidable opponent, who captured the seat held for 24 years by the late Glenn Anderson, a Democrat. Shortly after he was elected in 1992, Horn positioned himself as one of the leaders in the fight to save the C-17, then under attack for cost overruns and technical problems. The fight reached a peak in 1993, but the C-17 supporters eventually won.

“I have more friends in the UAW than who showed up at Gephardt’s rally,” Horn said. “They know who kept the C-17 going and stopped the onslaught [of opposition in Congress].”

By linking Horn to the conservative Gingrich, Zbur hopes to undermine Horn’s image as a Republican moderate.

During a recent debate on a local cable show, Zbur referred to Gingrich twice before he mentioned Horn’s name. “Newt Gingrich and the Republican Congress are taking this country backward,” he said.

Zbur, 39, criticizes Horn for voting to reduce Medicare spending below projected levels and for supporting tax cuts that would benefit wealthy individuals and corporations.

Horn likes to tell voters he is 65 and holds a Medicare card himself. “We aren’t slaughtering Medicare. I wouldn’t let that happen,” he said.

In turn, Horn says his opponent is an opportunist who saw the lopsided Democratic voter registration and moved into the 38th District just to run for Congress. Horn also criticizes Zbur’s background as a lawyer for corporate clients with regulatory problems.

During the cable debate on the show “Straight Talk,” Horn said Zbur once described himself as a corporate regulatory attorney but now calls himself an environmental attorney because it sounds better to voters.

Zbur told the cable audience that he gets support from the environmental community because he championed pro-environment strategies for large corporate clients. But Horn dismissed the clients as polluters.

“I assume they are the major polluters in Southern California or they wouldn’t be going to Latham & Watkins,” Horn said.

Horn and Zbur are splitting support from environmental groups, with Horn endorsed by the Sierra Club and Zbur receiving help from the California League of Conservation Voters, which gave Horn its lowest possible legislative rating.

The two men bring greatly dissimilar backgrounds to the race.

Horn has been in high-profile politics since the late 1950s, when he served in a top post in the Eisenhower administration’s Department of Labor. He worked in the U.S. Senate for Thomas Kuchel, a moderate Republican senator, from 1960 to 1966. Horn served as president of Cal State Long Beach for 17 years until he was forced to resign in 1987 amid criticism of gaping budget deficits and faculty criticism.

Zbur was raised on a farm in an impoverished rural community in New Mexico. His mother’s maiden name is Chavez, and Zbur said he comes from one of the state’s oldest Latino families. A good student, he graduated as a valedictorian and became the first person from his high school to attend an Ivy League university. He received his undergraduate degree from Yale University and went to Harvard Law School.

Another candidate in the race is Paul Gautreau, a 43-year-old attorney from Long Beach running as the Libertarian Party candidate. Gautreau concedes that he has no chance of winning and is running to spread the philosophy of his party.

The name of William Yeager will appear on the ballot as a Green Party candidate, but Yeager is in jail after being arrested for failing to register as a sex offender. He is being held in lieu of $500,000 bail.