WASHINGTON — The annual President’s Dinner, a Republican Party fundraising event featuring President Bush, could get an extra dash of spice this year with porn actress and former California gubernatorial candidate Mary Carey planning to attend.

The porn industry and Republicans may seem like strange bedfellows, but Carey said she sees Tuesday night’s dinner as a good opportunity to learn more about their policies and do some networking. She plans to run for lieutenant governor of California as an independent next year.

Carey acknowledges that some people just think of her as a busty blonde who does porn films.

“I also have a brain and political aspirations,” said Carey, whose priorities include legalizing gay marriage.

Carl Forti, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, which is co-hosting the dinner, had no qualms about Carey and her boss, adult film executive Mark Kulkis, attending.

“Their money was donated to the NRCC. The NRCC’s job is to elect Republicans. We’ll take that money and use it to elect more Republicans,” Forti said.

Carey was one of 135 candidates on the ballot to replace California Gov. Gray Davis in the 2003 recall election. Voters picked another actor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Kulkis, a self-described “Schwarzenegger Republican” who is fiscally conservative and socially liberal, was invited to the dinner by the NRCC and paid $5,000 for his and Carey’s plates.

Carey and Kulkis said they want to prove stereotypes of porn workers wrong.

“We’re not going to show up with coke spoons around our neck,” Kulkis said.