John Pérez is a fighter, but not always a winner

He placed the bill before senators one by one, handed them a pen and watched them sign. It was a signal to lawmakers that the measure was a priority for the man in what is commonly referred to as the second most powerful post in California government.

But when the bill went before the Senate last month, Pérez watched from the other side of the Capitol as it fell eight votes short of passage. Ten of his Democratic coauthors denied him their votes.

By many measures, Pérez, who cut his teeth in the Los Angeles labor movement, has had a successful 18 months as speaker. He has kept his caucus mostly happy and helped increase its ranks at election time. But the defeat of the Vernon bill and his public feuds with other lawmakers have led to whispers in Capitol watering holes and cloakrooms: His inexperience is showing.

Some, both inside and outside the Capitol, said he has consolidated power in his own house but not cultivated the relationships leaders need to advance their agendas in the Legislature.

"I love his politics, and I love him," said former state Sen. Sheila Kuehl, a Democrat from Santa Monica who has known him for two decades. "But I think he's made the choice to act as if he can make something happen by ordering it."

In the run-up to the Vernon vote, several of the bill's opponents said Pérez either killed or threatened to hold their legislation hostage as a way to muscle their votes. On Tuesday, state Sen. Kevin De Leon (D-Los Angeles) complained in a letter to the speaker that he learned from an oil lobbyist that his pet environmental bill was dying in the Assembly.

Pérez was ignoring the needs of the southeast Los Angeles communities they both represent, De Leon contended, and giving the oil industry "a free pass for business as usual."

Reclining in a chair on a balcony off the Assembly floor recently, Pérez , the son of a Mexican immigrant and a cousin of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, denied killing others' bills. He brushed off the criticism between puffs of a Montecristo cigar.

"If I were a bully," he said, laughing, "I would get my way."

The Assembly's Democrats elected him leader in his freshman term — as the state's first openly gay speaker — hoping to give him a relatively long tenure in the term-limits era. Many rush to praise him as an attentive master and astute strategist, focused on protecting his Democratic majority.

"He treats members like adults," said Assemblywoman Fiona Ma (D-San Francisco), one of his lieutenants. "He understands his job is to problem-solve and keep peace in the house."

His supporters credit him for championing a ballot initiative last year that made the Legislature able to pass state budgets with a simple majority. He helped save an embattled child-care program from the chopping block. He shepherded two big bills through the Assembly in recent weeks: Gov. Jerry Brown's tax plan and special treatment for a proposed football stadium in Los Angeles.

But despite the praise for him as a savvy operator when he was sworn in as speaker last year, others say Pérez lacks sufficient grace for the job. Many lobbyists, lawmakers and legislative staffers consider him thin-skinned and arrogant, though they will say so only in private. They fear angering the man who can bestow or yank powerful committee assignments, boost or kill legislation and award or withhold campaign cash.

"You can make the argument that he has not made the transition from somebody who is butting heads in the labor movement to someone who has to build coalitions," said Democratic strategist Darry Sragow.

In one of his first acts as a leader, even before he took the post, Pérez picked a partisan fight with then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Pérez led the Assembly vote against confirmation of Schwarzenegger's Republican nominee for the vacant lieutenant governor's job, a largely ceremonial backwater.

Capitol insiders say Pérez revels in the power of his office. He sits behind the massive desk that once belonged to Willie Brown, the self-proclaimed "ayatollah of the Assembly" who kept an iron grip on the chamber. Pérez had the desk pulled out of storage.

Pérez demanded this year that all 52 Assembly Democrats stand together on the state budget, although not all of their votes were needed for passage. He said the unanimity would demonstrate their strength, according to people who were in the room.

Assemblyman Anthony Portantino (D-La Cañada Flintridge) declined, becoming the sole member of his party to vote against the budget. Within days, Pérez had Portantino's office budget slashed, saying the lawmaker had overspent. Portantino went public.