LOS ANGELES -- At first, the latest ballot campaign roiling California looked like nothing more than a sideshow. The Republican gadflies promoting it lacked cash and public support. Even many GOP leaders scoffed at their audacious goal. Recall the newly reelected Democratic governor in a state his party dominates? Dream on, they said.

But then California's massive budget crisis grew more extreme, and public opinion polls showed Gov. Gray Davis (D) sinking to abysmal new lows. Then, a multimillionaire with his own ambitions of becoming governor stepped in and vowed to spend whatever it takes to get the measure on the ballot.

Now, amid signs the recall movement is gaining momentum, Democratic and Republican leaders are bracing for a political earthquake in the nation's most populous state, one whose tremors could ripple all the way to the White House.

"I don't think I've ever seen a political situation so uncertain and with so many potentially bizarre outcomes," said Bill Carrick, a veteran Democratic strategist here. "It's a really strange, eerie thing."

If the recall reaches the ballot -- and that could become clear by next month -- few of the usual rules of elections here would apply. Voters could be asked as early as this fall to decide Davis's fate in a special election. On that same ballot, voters then would be asked to choose his replacement. Potential candidates of both parties would need only a small number of signatures to be listed on the special ballot. There would be no primaries to whittle the field of candidates and the winner -- who would take office immediately -- would need only a plurality of votes, not a majority.

And that's only the beginning of the political intrigue emerging in the Golden State. Leaders in both parties say a recall could create a political free-for-all that California's 15 million voters have never seen.

Even as they scramble to crush the recall, prominent Democrats have begun discussing whether the party may have to take the extraordinary step of abandoning Davis if it reaches the ballot and rallying to a more formidable candidate, such as Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), to stop Republicans from seizing control of California.

Meanwhile, Republican leaders say they fear the move could galvanize the state's huge but disconsolate Democratic electorate and ruin President Bush's hopes of attracting many of those voters to his reelection campaign next year.

Some influential Republicans are so worried the recall could propel a conservative firebrand into a polarizing duel with Davis at a time when the party is desperate to broaden its appeal in California they are encouraging film star and political moderate Arnold Schwarzenegger to run for governor if a special election is held. He has not dismissed the idea.

Advocates of recalling Davis must gather nearly 900,000 valid voter signatures by the end of the summer in support of it. That had looked like a long shot. But now one group, which has dubbed its campaign "Rescue California," is being bankrolled by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), a multimillionaire newly elected to Congress. Issa, a political conservative who made his fortune selling car alarms, has donated close to half a million dollars to the cause. Last week, he opened a campaign office to run for governor if a recall election is scheduled. Some Republican state legislators are now openly backing the recall, too.

Issa, 49, said he is financing the movement primarily because Davis "grossly misled" the public about California's financial crisis during his reelection campaign last fall and is doing little to solve it now. "I feel obligated to prevent a train wreck," he said.

Every day, hundreds of paid workers for the recall effort are fanning out across California to gather support from voters who are expressing profound disdain with how Davis is managing the state -- which has a $38 billion deficit -- but are deeply divided about whether he should be kicked out of office.

One recent morning in Irvine, Calif., a suburb 50 miles south of Los Angeles, Randy Hill stood outside a shopping mall pleading with voters to sign recall petitions. He was being paid 75 cents for every signature he collected.

Some voters brushed him off. "I don't like the governor," said one delivery man who declined to give his name, "but I think we just ought to wait him out."

But others did not hesitate to sign. Hill, 53, told them the state was facing economic doom and that Davis was to blame. At times, he also tried to entice voters to back the recall by mentioning the prospect of a Schwarzenegger candidacy. "The Terminator!" he bellowed. In two hours, Hill had notched several dozen signatures.

"The guy's just a numbskull," Steven Lancaster said regarding Davis after signing the recall petition. "The sooner he goes, the better."

"I think he's kind of responsible for us going broke,'' said Martha Zerger, who also signed.

In a recent Field Poll, only 24 percent of voters approved of the job Davis is doing. And with no end in sight to the state's budget problems, scorn for Davis appears to be intensifying. At one recall rally this month, voters even mocked the governor's impeccable grooming. "We need fiscal management -- not perfect hair," one sign said.

Davis, 60, has been a fixture in California politics for three decades. He was elected governor in a landslide in 1998, when California's giant economy was booming. But when he ran for reelection last fall he barely defeated Republican businessman Bill Simon, who had never run for office and who stumbled through his campaign.

For months, Davis and his allies have called the recall a joke, not a threat. Some still say it is not likely to reach the ballot and is being managed by political lightweights. "This is the biggest conglomeration of malcontents, misfits and motor mouths I've ever seen," said Garry South, a longtime political adviser to Davis who no longer works for the governor.

Other Davis supporters say he should not be blamed for California's enormous deficit because the national economic slowdown has burdened many states with similar problems. They also contend that the refusal of GOP legislators to bargain over tax increases is exacerbating California's plight.

Activists have tried 31 times over the years to recall California governors. None of the efforts has succeeded. But this attempt is plainly beginning to rattle Democratic nerves. Backers claim they already have several hundred thousand signatures.

Labor unions and other interest groups close to the Democratic Party are organizing their own petition drive against the recall -- and offering California's mercenary army of signature gatherers better pay than Issa's group in an attempt to sap the recall movement's manpower. They plan to raise as much as $4 million to fight the measure.

"We're telling voters this is a choice between democracy and anarchy," said Dan Terry, president of the state firefighters union and a leader of the anti-recall campaign.

Davis, who had ignored the recall for months, also is now publicly denouncing it. He told the Los Angeles Times that Issa's decision to finance the movement and run for governor if it makes the ballot is "shameful."

"Stand up and be a man," Davis said. "Run like most people do."

Polls here show that a majority of voters would prefer not to have a recall election. But polls also show that if one occurs, Davis might lose. For that reason, the state's top Democrats are not ruling out candidacies, which has angered the governor's loyalists.

In an editorial published in many California newspapers recently, Feinstein, the state's senior and most popular elected official, urged voters not to support the recall, which she called "mean-spirited.'' She warned it could lead to the election of a fringe candidate and paralyze the state. "She hopes it doesn't succeed," said Howard Gantman, her spokesman. But when asked whether she might run if it reaches the ballot, he said that it was "premature" to address such a question.

The recall petition is not just alarming Democrats. Republicans, who do not hold any statewide offices and have been routed in California in the past two presidential elections, say the movement could backfire on them. Some party leaders here are warning the White House to pay closer attention to it.

Issa, they say, could be an easy target for Democratic attacks because of his conservative record, which includes past support for Proposition 187, a ballot measure that denied state services to undocumented immigrants. Republicans championed its passage a decade ago and have never recovered from how that step alienated California's large Latino electorate.

If the recall reaches the ballot, some Republicans say their best hope may be Schwarzenegger. He gained political notoriety last fall for leading a successful ballot measure to increase state funding for after-school programs. He also has expressed interest in becoming governor one day. "If the state needs me, and if there's no one I think is better, then I will run," Schwarzenegger is quoted as saying in the current issue of Esquire magazine.

George Gorton, a veteran Republican strategist who advises the film star, said that Schwarzenegger is discussing the recall with party power brokers but has made no plans to run. But Gorton also said that if a special election is called, it could be a "terrific" political opportunity for Schwarzenegger.

Leaders in both parties say they fear a recall ballot would be stuffed with candidates. The winner of such a race would be handed a budget crisis so severe virtually no Californian will be spared from it. "That's the prize," Carrick said.