Assembly district candidates weigh in

Alicia Robinson

All six Republican candidates for the 70th Assembly District seat

presented themselves together for the first time to a crowd of GOP

voters on Thursday.

The Orange County Federation of Republican Women’s luncheon

meeting at the Crown Plaza Resort Hotel featured a forum for

Republican candidates for state and federal offices and one county

supervisor seat.

Each candidate had five minutes to speak to the crowd of about 130

people. The speakers’ order was drawn randomly.

The 70th district candidates are seeking to replace Assemblyman

John Campbell, who is running for the 35th Senate District seat.

First to speak was Marianne Zippi, a Newport Beach business owner.

She opened her talk by bringing up a recent court battle over her

ballot statement, which will appear in sample ballots distributed to

voters in the district.

Scott Moody, a voter in the 70th district, challenged the use of

“good old boys” and other language in Zippi’s ballot statement. On

Dec. 30, Orange County Superior Court Commissioner Eleanor Palk

rejected the challenge based on the date the complaint was filed.

“I fought back and I won,” Zippi said.

The GOP “good old boys” don’t want a woman to run for the office,

she said.

“I am a conservative woman in a conservative district,” she said.

“Voters who want a woman to vote for have that choice now.”

Zippi is endorsed by prominent supporters of immigration reform,

and education is important to her, she said.

Chuck DeVore spoke next. A vice president at aerospace-defense

firm SM&A; in Newport Beach, DeVore also serves in the U.S. Army

National Guard.

He told the audience they should send to Sacramento “a Republican

you can trust, a Republican with a track record, a Republican that’s

always supported other Republicans.”

DeVore mentioned his 20 years of military service, his work for

Rep. Chris Cox from 1988 to 1990, and his five elected terms on the

Orange County Republican Party Central Committee.

If elected, he said, he would work for lower taxes, less

government regulation and workers’ compensation reform.

Cristi Cristich, who runs electronic connector manufacturer

Cristek Interconnects in Anaheim and lives in Corona del Mar, spoke

after DeVore.

After starting her own business at age 23, Cristich said, the

company now makes “parts that are used in Dick Cheney’s pacemaker and

Donald Rumsfeld’s missiles.”

Other candidates have brought up Cristich’s previous endorsement

of former President Bill Clinton -- she later called it a mistake --

so she addressed that, noting that she had supported his impeachment

and did not contribute any money to him.

“I’m a Republican because I believe in personal responsibility,

individual freedom, limited government and free enterprise,” she

said.

She touted her company’s creation of jobs and said she would be

effective at getting more people to vote Republican.

One candidate who hasn’t been very visible until now is Chonchol

D. Gupta, a 20-year-old mechanical engineering student at UC Irvine.

Some GOP members are skeptical of “new Republicans” like himself,

Gupta said.

He decided to run for office when a tuition increase of more than

$1,500 caused some of his friends to leave college, he said.

He suggested reforming immigration and workers compensation and

requiring illegal immigrants who work here to pay taxes.

Voters want “new, innovative candidates who are willing to say no

to special interest money and do what is right for the state of

California,” Gupta said.

Long K. Pham, who works as a consulting engineer in Long Beach,

was next to speak. He said he wants to repay society for the benefits

he’s enjoyed since coming to America from Vietnam as a child.

Government has a need for people with his expertise, he said.

“Our legislators make a lot of big decisions in Sacramento, but

sometimes they don’t have the background to understand it,” he said.

Rounding out the pack was Don Wagner, who serves on the board of

trustees of the South Orange County Community College District.

He cited his work as a trustee, noting the college was on the

state’s fiscal watch list when he joined the board but was

subsequently removed from the list.

“Every budget I’ve passed has been balanced,” Wagner said. “That’s

the kind of fiscal discipline I think we need in our legislators.”

The board also solved its problems with accreditation during his

tenure, he said.

“Of the candidates here, I’m the only one with [elected]

experience,” he said.