Perez Chosen Assembly Speaker
Pérez chosen as California Assembly speaker
By Jim Sanders
Only one year after capturing his first elective office, John A. Pérez was named Thursday to lead the Assembly into a crucial year of sky-high deficit and record-low voter approval.
The 40-year-old Los Angeles lawmaker and cousin of Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa was chosen unanimously as Assembly speaker by a caucus of his Democratic colleagues.
Pérez will be the state's first openly gay Assembly speaker once the formality of a floor vote is taken in January.
But Pérez, who left Thursday's Democratic caucus arm-in-arm with current Speaker Karen Bass and Assemblyman Kevin de León, his top rival for the post, deflected some of the spotlight from himself to colleagues.
"I think, in unity, we're not just talking about the election of a speaker," Pérez said. "We're talking about taking California forward, making sure that our collective effort is focused on the economic recovery of this state."
Pérez won respect this year as chairman of the Assembly Democratic Caucus.
"He's fair, he's inclusive, he's articulate, he's focused, he's a team player, and he's friends with everybody," said Assemblywoman Bonnie Lowenthal, D-Long Beach.
Before winning election to the Legislature last year, he had compiled a 15-year career with labor groups – most recently as political director for United Food and Commercial Workers.
Art Pulaski, secretary-treasurer of the California Labor Federation, said his group called a handful of legislators to back Pérez's candidacy.
"Most of his adult life has been around advocating for the middle and working classes," Pulaski said. "He'll bring a lot of experience, smarts and savvy toward doing that as leader of the Assembly."
Pérez is described by friends as a congenial intellectual with a rapid-fire wit, someone so enamored of the Bears – he attended the University of California at Berkeley but did not graduate – that the logo for his Assembly campaign featured a bear and Cal's blue-and-gold campus colors.
Political consultant Roger Salazar affectionately has dubbed the burly Pérez "Big Papi" – a throwback to the days of legendary Assembly Speaker Jesse "Big Daddy" Unruh.
Pérez is extremely knowledgeable about Mexican, Mexican American, and Jewish culture although he is not a Jew. He is a rabid college football fan, enjoys an occasional cigar, has a steel-trap mind, and has a fun-loving side, too, as exemplified perhaps by his collection of several dozen rubber duckies, said Eric Bauman, his best friend of many years.
Bauman said that he and Pérez raise eyebrows by engaging in a makeshift foreign language they call "Spiddish," a mix of Spanish and Yiddish.
"People are amazed to hear us," said Bauman, vice chairman of the state Democratic Party.
Republicans said they differ markedly in political ideology with both Pérez and de León, finalists for the speaker's job, so the Democrats' choice Thursday made no substantive difference in prospects for GOP legislation.
Assemblyman Anthony Adams, R–Hesperia, said Pérez has demonstrated a "great deal of integrity and steady handedness" and that Republicans must find a way to work with whoever takes the helm because the minority party holds only 28 of 79 seats (there is one vacancy).
"Candidly, what choice do we have?" Adams said.
Pérez will take the job at a time when the state is reeling from recession, trying to recover from massive budget cuts, facing a projected shortfall of more than $20 billion by mid-2011, and is struggling with problems ranging from unemployment to prison overcrowding.
Pérez said he is up to the challenge.
"I think it's a big task," he said. "It's a task that's not just laid on one person, it's laid on the Assembly collectively. And I think with the support of all my colleagues, I'm absolutely up to it."
Assemblyman Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, said he is confident that Pérez has the personality, political savvy and negotiating skills to succeed.
"I have no illusions that he's going to start on day one as the next (Assembly boss) Willie Brown or anything like that," Huffman said. "But he's someone with all the skills that one would need to grow into the job."
A former member of the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency, Pérez also has served on the Democratic National Committee and on boards ranging from the California League of Conservation Voters to the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation.
Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, a San Francisco Democrat who also is openly gay, applauded Pérez as a "symbol of hope and inspiration" to people of color and to the lesbian, gay, transgender and bisexual communities.
But Randy Thomasson, president of SaveCalifornia.com, an advocacy group on family and social issues, said he is concerned that Pérez will push for new gay rights laws.
"John A. Pérez is an aggressive supporter of the sexual indoctrination of schoolchildren, homosexual 'marriages,' and punishing business owners that don't support homosexuality and cross-dressing," Thomasson said.
Pérez said he will "represent the interests of all people in the state of California," regardless of sexual orientation.
Pérez has been a prodigious fundraiser, a quality by which potential Assembly leaders typically are judged. He raised nearly $1 million for his Assembly race last year and donated more than $100,000 to the state Democratic Party, records show.
Top donors to Perez's campaign last year included the California Teachers Association, Peace Officers Research Association of California, and more than a dozen labor unions, ranging from California Teamsters to the state Labor Federation and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
Pérez, affable by nature, is known for sparking chuckles.
During one marathon legislative session, lasting all day and until nearly sunrise the next morning, Pérez lifted his microphone to speak on the Assembly floor as the hours droned on.
The presiding officer asked for what purpose he had risen.
"To stay awake," Pérez replied.
