26% of Valley’s Republicans Join Buchanan Brigade

In a significant departure that analysts say may be due to a concentration of former Reagan Democrats in the San Fernando Valley’s blue-collar neighborhoods, local Republicans showed far more support for the presidential candidacy of Patrick J. Buchanan than Californians as a whole.

Fully 26% of Valley Republicans supported the crusty populist compared to just 17% in traditionally conservative Orange County, 21% in Los Angeles County and 18.5% across the state.

Valley GOP members supported the primary’s winner, Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, by 60%, trailing the statewide average of 66%.

The vote was a departure from the Valley’s support of other issues. Residents here mirrored their counterparts in voting against repealing a ban on hunting mountain lions and reluctantly favoring Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti over a legion of contenders.

Even in traditionally liberal areas, Republicans in the Valley chose Buchanan over Dole in significantly greater numbers, according to a Times analysis of votes cast in Tuesday’s election. In some neighborhoods, support was as high as 30%.

“The Valley is known for its conservatism,” said GOP consultant Allen Hoffenbloom. Much of Buchanan’s support, he suggested, came from blue-collar Republicans who until the Reagan era identified themselves as Democrats.

These voters, many of whom have seen their living standards plummet over the past decade, responded to Buchanan’s populist message, Hoffenbloom said.

In addition, he suggested, single-issue voters, like firearms-rights advocates and abortion opponents, might have favored Buchanan over Dole.

Perhaps surprisingly, voters in the northeast Valley supported Buchanan by 30%, the highest concentration of support in the Valley.

Councilman Richard Alarcon, whose district includes the northeast Valley, said that a number of factors may have contributed to Buchanan’s impact.

Some Republicans who voted for Buchanan, Alarcon suggested, might be longtime white residents who fear the changes the community is undergoing as more minority residents moved in.

However, he said, many of the district’s Latino voters are very religious and may have supported Buchanan because of his opposition to abortion.

Peggy Mew, Buchanan’s California campaign coordinator, said the Valley represents just the type of coalition Buchanan was aiming for: working families, conservative minorities and religious conservatives.

She also suggested that immigrants who came to the U.S. legally might have rallied to Buchanan’s strong opposition to illegal immigration.

In other issues, the Valley supported Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti by just 37%, the same proportion of votes he drew from the rest of L.A. County.

Valley voters supported Proposition 192, a bond issue for seismic retrofitting of public bridges and overpasses, by a slightly larger margin than voters statewide.

And the region joined the rest of the state in defeating the three propositions aimed at limiting attorneys’ fees.

To reach these conclusions, The Times analyzed voting patterns from four Los Angeles City Council districts on the Valley floor, including areas represented by Joel Wachs, Laura Chick, Alarcon and Hal Bernson. The figures were provided by the Los Angeles County Registrar of Voters.