Dornan has no proof, but that hasn’t stopped him from accusing the 36-year-old former financial planner of stealing the election. With most of the ballots counted, Sanchez has a 665-vote lead. Dornan’s chances of pulling ahead seem to shrink with every new round of ballot-counting. Sanchez, meanwhile, has declared victory and decamped to Washington for freshman orientation. If her margin holds, it will be compelling evidence that Orange County, long dominated by white Republicans, is beginning to look like much of the rest of southern California: culturally and ethnically diverse.
Dornan isn’t one to go quietly. Always flamboyant, he combines a flair for the dramatic (his uncle is Jack Haley, who played The Tin Man in ““The Wizard of Oz’’) with hard-right politics (he’s Rush Limbaugh’s favorite substitute host). At 63, the former fighter pilot has made a career of bashing liberals, feminists, communists and gays. He loves attacking Bill Clinton, denouncing the president as a ““womanizer,’’ an ““adulterer’’ and a ““disgraced draft dodger’’ who demeans the office with his ““silk girlie-girlie jogging pants showing those beautiful white doughboy thighs of his.’’ (““Every time I see Dornan,’’ Clinton has said, ““he looks like he needs a rabies shot.’’) Loyalists back home relished Dornan’s riffs, and ““B-1 Bob’’ was good to his supporters. In a district dependent on defense contracts, he has strongly supported every Pentagon spending program.
So what happened? At first, Sanchez was regarded as a weak candidate. She got into trouble for allowing a former business partner convicted of forgery and tax fraud to contribute to her campaign. There were even doubts about whether she lived in the district. Until recently, she and her husband lived in Los Angeles County. Sanchez tried to prove she was no carpetbagger by inviting the press on guided tours of her Orange County condo.
But the numbers worked against Dornan. His district is no longer just the white-bread suburban home of Disneyland and conservative military retirees. Latinos and Asians have steadily streamed in, with the growing Mexican-American community centered in Santa Ana, the county seat. Whites now make up 36 percent of the district’s population; Latinos about 50 percent. At government offices, callers can choose messages recorded in English, Spanish and Vietnamese. Sanchez had an advantage in this new world. Angered by the immigrant-bashing of 1994’s Proposition 187 campaign, which Dornan backed, thousands of Latinos registered and voted for the first time this year.
Dornan is calling on Congress to investigate his charges, but if Sanchez is declared the winner, it’s unlikely the House will overturn that decision. Meanwhile, he is putting a positive spin on a post-Congress career, hinting he may return home to talk radio. From there he can harangue Sanchez until 1998, when he’s threatening to run again. Dornan may soon be out of work in Washington, but California hasn’t heard the last of B-1 Bob.
