GOP’s Rohrabacher not just target of Dems

The Democrats aren’t the only ones with too many congressional candidates running for Orange County seats. The GOP has a civil war going down in the 48th Congressional District, where former Republican Assembly Leader

Scott Baugh launched a lastminute challenge to Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, the 15-term congressman who is the star of every Democratic target list.

OC Republicans were so fretful about Baugh that Orange County Republican Party chairman Fred Whitaker

wrote a letter to Baugh that said: “Proceeding on your current path is destructive to the Republican Party of Orange County, which you helped build. It is divisive and presents an unnecessary distraction … we need you to be a unifying force. If you choose to move forward with your candidacy it will be over our objections and without our support.”

The OC GOP hand-delivered the note to Baugh the night before the filing deadline this month. Over a list of names of elected officials and local leaders it said, “We all endorse Congressman Rohrabacher in his re-election to Congress.”

There’s a problem with at least one of the names listed on that letter: California Republican Party chairman Jim

Brulte. When The Chronicle sent him a copy and asked if he signed it, Brulte said, “I did not!!!”

“First I ever saw it,” Brulte wrote in an email to The Chronicle, noting that the California Republican Party has endorsed Rohrabacher. “Heard about a letter but no one asked me.”

Regardless of who really signed the letter, Whitaker said, “It unfortunately didn’t work.”

He’s worried that the Baugh-Rohrabacher race will divert too much grassroots energy, fundraising and attention from the three other Orange County seats the GOP has to defend.

“People either like Scott or they like Dana. My concern is if their guy loses, people pick up their toys and go home,” Whitaker said. “They can’t do that. We need their help in these other races.”

The good news for Whitaker: A survey this month by the Democratic Fight Back CA PAC found that Baugh has pulled even with the Democrats in the field — giving Republicans a decent shot at having both Baugh and Rohracher make it out of the June 5 primary.