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Even G.O.P. Could Face a Bumpy Road in California Recall They must keep the Democrats and Mr. Davis, who won re-election eight months ago with only 47 percent of the vote, from persuading more than half the electorate to side with him. And they must do so at a time Mr. Davis's approval ratings have sunk to historic lows. "Gray Davis is the only person on the recall ballot who has to win 50 percent of the vote, and last November he didn't even get that," said Dave Gilliard, a consultant to Rescue California, a pro-recall group. "It is a huge mountain for him to climb." Beyond the mathematics, the Republicans are finding that their recall task grows more difficult. Unlike Mr. Davis and the Democrats, the Republicans do not have the advantage of running a campaign focused on a single question and a single person, which could have implications for the Republicans regarding everything from fund-raising to campaign strategy. The Republicans must not only convince enough voters to oust Mr. Davis, they must also position a Republican candidate to win the replacement part of the recall ballot should Mr. Davis lose. The replacement ballot is a horse race. The top vote getter, no matter how big or small the margin, wins. Anything short of a victorious Republican about to move into the governor's office on Oct. 8 would be deemed a dismal failure for the party. Those tasks will be particularly challenging over the next two weeks, some Republican strategists said. The Democrats are moving quickly to define the recall campaign in terms favorable to Mr. Davis. But the Republicans are not even certain which Republicans will enter the race and what financial resources they might bring. As an example, a campaign with a field of candidates dominated by Representative Darrell Issa, the San Diego conservative who financed the recall's signature-gathering, or by Bill Simon Jr., who lost to Mr. Davis in November, would look extremely different from one featuring a bigger-than-life personality like the actor Arnold Schwarzenegger. "I think the strategies are going to be developed here on the fly over the next two weeks," Mr. Gilliard said. "I would be surprised if in two weeks we have the exact same scenario that we have now." The pivotal date for Republicans is Saturday, Aug. 9, the final day candidates can file their papers to run with county elections officials. State officials had said that the deadline would be pushed back to Aug. 11, because Aug. 9, the date mandated by state law, falls on a weekend. A spokeswoman for the secretary of state's office said today that the Aug. 9 deadline would be enforced because county elections officials across the state agreed to open their offices until 5 p.m. that day. The spokeswoman, Terri M. Carbaugh, said Secretary of State Kevin Shelley would have until Aug. 13 to certify the list of candidates. Until that list is final, Democrats say, they believe that they have a jump on the Republicans. "We are at the beginning of spring training, and we already have our team, and we know what the issues will be," Bob Mulholland, a campaign adviser to the state Democratic Party, said. "While the Republicans are starting spring training, and they don't have a quarterback." Rob Stutzman, a spokesman for the state Republican Party, said Mr. Mulholland and other Democrats were playing down the fissures in their party, particularly whether a Democratic candidate might appear on the recall ballot as a possible successor to Mr. Davis.
Democrats have insisted that no
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