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LOS ANGELES — A political activist organization with ties to the Reform Party said Thursday it will try to get Tuesday’s mayoral election postponed due to alleged campaign finance violations by the state Republican and Democratic parties and two of the leading candidates. 

Jim Mangia, a Reform Party member who headed the party faction that challenged presidential nominee Pat Buchanan last year, said he will file a lawsuit against the state’s two leading parties for “illegally corrupting and tainting the Los Angeles mayoral race” and against two campaigns for conspiring with the parties to violate campaign finance law. 

The announcement came amid rising tensions in the tight mayoral race, which was marked by an off-stage shouting match this week between real estate broker Steve Soboroff and City Attorney James K. Hahn as they prepared to debate one another. Hahn called on Soboroff to reveal who is funding the Republican Party’s member communication campaign in support of Soboroff, while Soboroff described Hahn as “desperate.” 

The argument hit at the heart of Mangia’s complaint, which alleges the mayoral campaigns of Soboroff and former state Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa have violated the new campaign finance measure known as Proposition 34. 

Mangia’s coalition, which he says is represented by a pro bono attorney, alleges the parties violated the law by using funds to promote Soboroff and Villaraigosa without immediately reporting the source of income. 

He also accused the parties of allowing donors to earmark funds for candidates, which is illegal. 

“To allow the election to go forth under the present circumstances would confront L.A. with a mayor whose election would have been the product and result of fraud and corruption and create a debacle much worse than the situation we have witnessed in the recent presidential election in Florida,” said Mangia, president of the Coalition for Political Reform. 

Mangia said he planned to file his lawsuit Friday or Monday in state court and seek an injunction to postpone the election if the city Elections Division doesn’t do so. 

Elections Division spokeswoman Kristin Heffron said it is outside of the division’s authority to halt the election unless a judge orders so. Barbara Freeman, spokeswoman for the city Ethics Commission, said she was prohibited from commenting on whether there was is a pending investigation into the claims. 

Both parties denied accusations Thursday that they violated Proposition 34, maintaining that they never accepted earmarked donations and have every right to spend money to communicate with their members about the mayoral race. 

Villaraigosa’s spokeswoman Elena Stern described the announcement Thursday as a ploy to distract people from recent poll numbers that show Hahn’s lead over Villaraigosa and Soboroff diminishing. She said it seemed like more than a coincidence that the lawsuit announcement came on the heels of Hahn’s criticism of the party contributions to Villaraigosa and Soboroff’s campaigns. 

“His accusations against the Democratic Party serves as somewhat of a sour grapes distraction from that movement,” she said. 

Hahn spokesman Kam Kuwata said he had not seen the complaint, but that “the spirit of the law is clear to us – that full disclosure of money into the campaign is what voters wanted, what various legislative bodies have wanted.” 

Tony Miller, a campaign finance reform proponent who opposed Proposition 34 as insufficient, argued that the measure is vague and should be addressed in the courts. 

“We pointed out during the Proposition 34 campaign the danger in this regard and the fuzzy interpretation which could allow for the very abuse which we see right now,” he said. “I certainly don’t think it’s what the people intended when they voted for Proposition 34.” 

Fifteen candidates are vying for the nonpartisan seat. If no single candidate receives more than 50 percent of the vote, the top two finishers will face one another in a June runoff.