Don't read their lips when California's Republican lawmakers say 'no new taxes' – they've put it in writing, signed their names, essentially inviting their own party to oust them if they renege.
Every GOP lawmaker except Fair Oaks Assemblyman Roger Niello has signed the "Taxpayer Protection Pledge" this year, casting a shadow on budget talks by making any vote to raise taxes a potential career killer.
"If you break the pledge, the people who voted for you will say, 'Excuse me, not only did you raise my taxes but you lied to me,' " said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, in Washington, D.C., which conducts the pledge drive nationwide.
The tax pledge, whose signers are publicized on the group's Web site, is a written promise to voters that "I will oppose and vote against any and all efforts to increase taxes."
Opponents argue that such vows can torpedo budget talks by making the outcome intensely personal and hamper efforts to find tradeoffs in bridging the state's $15.2 billion deficit.
"They've put themselves in a box that leaves Bush-style borrowing as their only exit strategy," Steve Maviglio, spokesman for Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, said in a written statement.
"Effective governing requires compromise," added incoming Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento. "In part because of the pledge, and what underlies it, they've limited their ability to be effective partners in government."
Passing a budget requires a two-thirds supermajority in each house, so Democrats need at least two GOP votes in the Senate and six in the Assembly to pass any spending plan covering the fiscal year that began eight weeks ago.
Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has not signed the tax pledge, rocked GOP ranks this month by proposing a 1-cent sales tax increase for three years, which then would drop permanently to a quarter-cent below the current rate.
Norquist said the proposal, touted by supporters as a long-term cut, would violate the anti-tax pledge because its goal is to create an immediate increase of $4 billion in state revenues.
"Nobody believes for 30 seconds that the tax cut really happens," he said.
Aaron McLear, Schwarzenegger's spokesman, said the governor hates tax increases, too, but that no budget deal can be struck without sacrifice.
"Republicans and Democrats need to come out of their corners and compromise," he said. That's the only way we're going to get through this."
Though nearly every legislative seat has been drawn to protect the party holding it now, incumbents can be vulnerable in primary elections, where reneging on a tax pledge could prove disastrous.
Four GOP assemblymen were denounced as traitors seven years ago when they broke party ranks, in exchange for millions in district incentives, to side with Democrats on a state budget that raised the sales tax by a quarter-cent.
Two of the GOP dissidents, Mike Briggs and Richard Dickerson, were targeted and defeated in later GOP primaries.
David Kelley and Anthony Pescetti, of Rancho Cordova, did not run again. In the Senate, Maurice Johannessen was ostracized by colleagues for casting the necessary GOP budget vote.
Lew Uhler, president of the National Tax Limitation Committee, said he will join with other watchdog groups this year to hold lawmakers accountable if they violate the tax pledge.
"There is no question they will hold your feet to the fire if you break that pledge," said Assemblyman Tom Berryhill, R-Modesto. "Down the road, whatever you run for, it will haunt you."
Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, said the tax pledge simply documents a stark reality for Republicans.
"I think, quite frankly, with or without the pledge, if they were to vote for a tax increase, there would be consequences," Coupal said.
The anti-tax pledges are not legally enforceable, but state Sen. Tom McClintock, a Thousand Oaks Republican who helped solicit them months ago, said they are taken very seriously by signers.
"I believe that every one of them is a man or woman of their word, so no, I don't expect that they would break a written contract with their constituents," McClintock said.
Larry Gerston, political science professor at San Jose State University, said the tax pledge tightens GOP ranks and makes it harder to pick off Republican votes for a compromise budget.
"You have the deepest chasm I can remember," Gerston said. "Even the governor knocking heads does nothing here."
Niello, the lone GOP lawmaker not to sign the tax pledge, said he consistently has opposed broad-based tax hikes nonetheless.
"I just don't like to sign pledges," he said.
Call Jim Sanders, Bee Capitol Bureau, (916) 326-5538.
