Reinecke served in the U.S. House of Representatives between 1965 and 1969. As a member of the Interior Committee, he worked to preserve Western rivers. In 1969, President Richard Nixon appointed California’s Lieutenant GovernorRobert Finch to be the U.S. Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare. To fill the vacancy, Governor Ronald Reagan appointed then-Congressman Reinecke as Lieutenant Governor on January 9, 1969. He was re-elected in 1970. In 1974, Reinecke ran for the Republican nomination for Governor of California to succeed Reagan, who chose not to seek a third term. As part of the conservative wing of the Republican Party in contrast with the more moderate State ControllerHouston Flournoy, he could expect a strong conservative turnout for the primary election. Early in the race, he held a lead over Flournoy. He had just earned the endorsement of the California Republican Assembly, a leading conservative group, when a Federal grand jury indicted him for perjury on April 3, 1974.
Indictment and Conviction
Reinecke’s indictment was an offshoot of the investigation into the Watergate scandal. In 1972, he testified before the Senate during a confirmation hearing of Richard Kleindienst, the nominee for Attorney General. He was asked about an offer by Sheraton Hotels, a division of ITT Inc., which was the subject of a Federal antitrust investigation, to underwrite the 1972 Republican National Convention. Specifically, the committee wanted to know if he discussed the offer with the Watergate figure and former Attorney General John N. Mitchell before of after ITT settled its case with the government. He told Senator Hiram Fong that the conversation took place after the settlement despite his earlier comment to a reporter that the conversation had taken place several months earlier. Reinecke stayed in the race for governor, but was defeated by Flournoy, who went on to lose to Jerry Brown in the general election. He was convicted of perjury in July 1974, but refused to resign until the state law required him to do so. California law barred anyone convicted of perjury from holding office in the state; but the state attorney general ruled that this provision would not take effect until sentencing. On October 2, 1974, he was sentenced to an 18-month suspended term and resigned from office the same day. On December 8, 1975, an appeals court overturned the ruling because "the Senate Judiciary Committee before which he was accused of perjuring himself had failed to publish its rule permitting a one-man quorum."
