The Nunez legacy

When fabian Nunez steps down as Assembly speaker later this year, his imprint on the Capitol will not immediately disappear. He leaves in place a political machine that served him well and will continue to serve his successor, Karen Bass. That’s a legacy that no other speaker in the era of term limits has left behind.

How did he do it? Well, for one thing, he enjoyed an enormous advantage from the get-go. He was the first freshman to hold the speaker position since the Legislature’s earliest days. In the era of term limits, that meant he could stay in the job for at least four years -- making him the longest-serving speaker since Willie Brown left the Assembly in 1995 after 15 years in the post.

Nunez arrived in Sacramento with another advantage. As political director of the powerful Los Angeles County Federation of Labor during the coalition’s heyday in the mid-to-late 1990s, he was more politically savvy than your average freshman lawmaker, and he knew who the Capitol players were. In fact, when Assembly Democrats deadlocked over who would replace Herb Wesson as speaker four years ago, it was the federation’s then-executive director, Miguel Contreras, who helped broker the deal that put his protege -- Nunez -- in charge of the Assembly.

Some Capitol observers and lawmakers say Nunez has been the most effective speaker since Brown -- at least when it came to keeping Assembly members in line. He maintained discipline in a house that saw two-thirds of its membership turn over since his election as speaker. And under his leadership, the Assembly’s reputation as the lesser of the two chambers has been largely dispelled. For instance, a number of top staffers who had once served in the Assembly but moved on to the state Senate returned to work for Nunez. The added experience on Nunez’s staff meant more power for the speaker.

In setting the parameters -- and ultimately determining the outcome -- of the race to choose his successor, Nunez showed the political skill and ferocity not only of Contreras but also of his four years as speaker.

The speakership battle began Feb. 5, the day voters rejected a term-limits reform measure sponsored by Nunez that would have allowed him to hold on to the speakership for six more years. With Proposition 93’s demise, Nunez, who’s scheduled to be termed out in December 2008, became a lame duck -- sort of.

Despite losing at the ballot box, Nunez controlled the race to succeed him from the beginning. Two days after the defeat of Proposition 93, Nunez announced that the vote for a new speaker would take place March 11. On Feb. 27, he started phoning members or inviting them into his office to announce his support for Bass and pressure them to get on board.

The race was over in a matter of hours, with Bass securing the 25 Democratic votes necessary to win the job.

This is not to take anything away from Bass, who serves as Nunez’s majority floor leader, the No. 2 position in the Assembly. Nunez and Bass have been politically connected since her first days in the Capitol -- a connection that ran directly through Contreras. In 2004, Bass won a contested three-way Democratic primary to represent the 47th Assembly District, beating former City Councilman Nate Holden and lawyer Rickie Ivey. A virtual unknown in Sacramento, Bass, a community activist in South Los Angeles, attracted strong grass-roots support, but her campaign received a major boost when Contreras’ 800,000-member federation backed her.

Though the speaker’s gavel will now pass to Bass, the team that has helped run the Assembly under Nunez will remain largely intact. Nunez’s political consultant, Gale Kaufman, wields wide influence over the chamber’s political operations, and that is not expected to change under Bass. Nunez’s chief fundraiser, Dan Weitzman, also handles fundraising for Bass. In addition, Steve Maviglio, the speaker’s spinmeister and hatchet man, is expected to stay on and assist Bass.

Although Bass does not have Nunez’s reputation for throwing sharp elbows, she will inherit much of what Nunez helped build. And whatever Nunez decides to do next, he will have a direct pipeline to the speaker’s office.

So what’s next for Nunez? In strictly running the Assembly, he stepped on many toes and will leave office with his share of enemies. His use of campaign dollars for trips to Europe and stays in four-star hotels, as well as to buy lavish gifts and expensive wines, earned him media scrutiny and may have contributed to the defeat of Proposition 93. But even his detractors admired the discipline with which he ran the chamber.

Nunez attached his name to the most high-profile legislation of the last four years, including the landmark global warming measure and the healthcare reform bill that died in the state Senate last month. More important for his political future, he will leave office with more than $6 million in his campaign account.

Nunez’s wife, Maria Robles, is also a Capitol player. She works for the Sacramento-based Californians for Patient Care, a nonprofit with ties to the California Hospitals Assn.

Nunez has already ruled out a run for the Los Angeles City Council, and speculation that he would run for mayor was quashed when his friend Antonio Villaraigosa announced he would seek another term in 2009. Like Villaraigosa, Nunez is a national co-chairman of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s presidential campaign, so perhaps a trip to Washington is in the cards if she prevails in the presidential election.

Other offices Nunez might seek include Gil Cedillo’s state Senate seat, which is open in 2010, or a possible run for statewide office, such as for insurance commissioner, which would presumably open up if Steve Poizner runs for governor.

Yet with so many options, Nunez faces something of an uncertain political future. But for now, he can revel in the fact that he leaves power the same way he acquired and wielded it in the Assembly -- through a decisive use of raw political force.

In the game of power politics, it may be years before the Assembly sees another one as calculating, as brazen and as effective as Nunez.