Schwarzenegger signs on to play GOP hero in recall

Dianne Feinstein says she won't run, but later a surprise announcement dims Gov. Gray Davis' joy.

LOS ANGELES - The Terminator is in.

After keeping voters on edge for weeks, actor Arnold Schwarzenegger surprised pundits by announcing Wednesday he's running for governor in California's increasingly chaotic election to recall Gov. Gray Davis.

"The politicians are fiddling, fumbling and failing," Schwarzenegger, a Republican, said while taping The Tonight Show With Jay Leno. "The man that is failing the people more than anyone is Gray Davis. He is failing them terribly, and this is why he needs to be recalled and this is why I am going to run for governor."

Schwarzenegger's announcement capped a day of fast-paced developments.

Earlier, Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein had ruled out a run, labeling the election "more and more like a carnival every day." And political commentator Arianna Huffington said she would run as an independent.

Schwarzenegger's advisers had said in recent days he was leaning against putting his name on the Oct. 7 election ballot because of opposition from his wife, journalist Maria Shriver. Schwarzenegger, 56, said he and his wife discussed his future over the past few weeks and she stood by his decision. The couple have four children, ranging in age from 5 to 13.

Davis issued a statement calling Schwarzenegger merely the latest in a long list of people who had declared their intent to run, noting that Hustler publisher Larry Flynt is among them.

"The more candidates who join, the greater the likelihood that a small minority of voters will be controlling California's future," Davis said.

If more than 50 percent of voters vote to recall Davis, whichever of the possibly hundreds of candidates on the ballot who gets the most votes will take his place.

Schwarzenegger's moderate views - he has been reported to favor abortion rights, gay rights and gun control - automatically makes him a frontrunner among the Republican candidates trying to unseat Davis in traditionally liberal California.

His name recognition, meanwhile, is almost unparalleled among the hundreds of potential candidates who say they're interested in Davis' job.

But the campaign also poses risks for the first-time candidate.

In a Los Angeles Times poll published last month, many voters said they were wary of Schwarzenegger. Only 26 percent said they were leaning toward supporting him, while 53 percent said they were not inclined to vote for him.

Schwarzenegger told Leno he's not afraid of Davis allies attacking him as a "womanizer" or a "terrible person." "I know that they're going to throw everything at me," he said.

Former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, another moderate Republican, has said he would enter the race if Schwarzenegger did not, and polls have shown Riordan would be a stronger candidate. Riordan's spokeswoman said before Schwarzenegger's decision was made public the former mayor was deliberating with his family and no announcement was scheduled before Friday.

Feinstein's decision not to run gave a big boost to Davis, while frustrating some Democrats who wanted her to run to ensure the governorship would remain in the party's hands if Davis lost.

"After thinking a great deal about this recall, its implications for the future, and its misguided nature, I have decided that I will not place my name on the ballot," Feinstein said in a statement.

Analysts from both parties believed the governor's chances for survival would have dramatically diminished if Feinstein, who tops polls as California's most popular politician, was on the ballot as an alternative.

Members of the state's Democratic congressional delegation held an urgent conference call Wednesday, in which there was a "growing consensus" that a Democratic alternative to Davis must enter the recall race, participant Rep. Cal Dooley said.

"There is still time to identify another candidate, and I think that we are fortunate that we have a very deep bench of prominent Democrats in this state," Dooley said.

Among the potential candidates most frequently mentioned during the conference call were Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante and Leon Panetta, a former California congressman and chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, Dooley said. Candidates have until 8 p.m. EDT Saturday to qualify for the election.

Bustamante scheduled a news conference for this morning. A spokesman said he was likely to run.

Another possibility is U.S. Rep. Loretta Sanchez, who had supported a Feinstein candidacy and said she might run if Feinstein didn't.

"I have a feeling something will be decided tomorrow probably one way or the other," Sanchez's spokeswoman, Carrie Brooks, said.

Huffington, the ex-wife of former Republican congressman Michael Huffington, announced her candidacy in Los Angeles.

"I'm not, to say the least, a conventional candidate. But these are not conventional times," she said. "And if we keep electing the same kind of politicians who got us into the same kind of mess funded by the same kind of special interests, we'll never get out of this mess."

Michael Huffington has taken out papers, but has not said whether he will enter the race.

The ballot also is likely to include several conservative Republicans. U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa, who funded the recall, is a declared candidate, and state Sen. Tom McClintock filed papers Tuesday. Businessman Bill Simon, who lost to Davis in November, also is expected to run.

And Schwarzenegger won't be the only Arnold in the race. Gary Coleman, who starred as Arnold Drummond in the 1980s sitcom Diff'rent Strokes, plunked down $3,500 in Alameda County on Wednesday and declared himself a candidate.

- Information from Cox News Service, the Associated Press, the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times was used in this report.

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