Costa Mesa’s conservative mayor on mailer with Democrats

Costa Mesa voters saw an odd pairing of political candidates in their mailboxes this week when they received a flier promoting conservative Mayor Jim Righeimer with a slate of heavy-hitting Democrats up for election.

Gov. Jerry Brown topped the list, followed by a host of prominent Democrats running for office in California in Tuesday’s election.

But Righeimer is a Costa Mesa Republican known for his fight against public employee unions — something that contrasts with Brown’s backing from labor.

“Politics makes strange bedfellows,” said Fred Smoller, an associate professor of political science at Chapman University in Orange.

The mailer, sent by a group called Democratic Voters Choice, isn’t affiliated with any of the candidates it’s promoting. And, despite its name, it has no ties to the Democratic Party.

Democratic Voters Choice is one of many slate-mailer organizations that add to the flood of political postage during California’s election season.

The organizations, however, aren’t sending out literature to advance a public policy goal, Smoller said. They’re doing it to turn a profit by charging candidates who want to appear on a slate.

“I would take those things with a grain of salt,” Smoller said. “The only thing it says about Jim Righeimer’s campaign is its ability to write a check.”

In this case, Righeimer paid about $250 to Democratic Voters Choice, according to campaign finance filings.

Assemblyman Allan Mansoor (R-Costa Mesa), who is running for the Orange County Board of Supervisors, also appears on the slate. He paid Democratic Voters Choice about $1,500, according to finance documents.

According to the mailer, Righeimer, Mansoor and Orange County assessor candidate Claude Parrish are the only politicians who paid to be part of the slate that was promoted to Costa Mesans.

Because municipal elections are nonpartisan, Righeimer said he didn’t see anything wrong with appearing with a slate of Democrats.

“It’s a nonpartisan city, and we want to make sure we communicate with everybody,” he said.