The GOP Senate primary opponents explore each other's record on the hot-button issue and offer unflattering assessments.

01:00 AM EDT on Tuesday, July 18, 2006

BY KATHERINE GREGG
Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE -- To hear U.S. Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee tell it, his Republican primary opponent believes "we should recruit illegal labor at the border."

But the way his opponent -- Cranston Mayor Stephen P. Laffey -- tells the story, Chafee voted for an immigration bill that would guarantee "higher salaries for foreign workers" than the American laborers working side-by-side with them on private construction projects.

Smoldering for months, the debate was reignited in recent days by the arrival in mailboxes throughout Rhode Island of a Chafee campaign flier that accuses Laffey of "straddling the fence on immigration" and says he "can't be trusted to secure our borders." The Laffey campaign returned fire with this equally disputed accusation: "Chafee immigration plan favors foreign workers over American employees."

Bottom line: A spokeswoman for Laffey said he would not have voted -- as Chafee did -- for the compromise bill creating a path to citizenship for some of the estimated 11 million to 12 million people living in the United States illegally that cleared the Senate in May with support from the likes of Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee. The Senate bill provides a lengthy pathway to citizenship for current illegal immigrants if they learn English and pay back taxes and a fine.

Laffey's blast was centered on a provision in the Senate bill that requires the payment of local prevailing wages to temporary, foreign workers in all construction jobs, including private construction. The federal Davis-Bacon Act currently only provides such guarantees to construction workers on federally financed projects.

Laffey cited an analysis by the Republican Policy Committee, chaired by Sen. John Kyl, R-Ariz., that said the bill "would guarantee wages to some foreign workers that could be higher than those paid to American workers at the same worksite. This is unfair to U.S. workers, inappropriate and unnecessary."

He also zinged Chafee for being on the winning side of a razor-thin 50-to-49 vote to table a proposed amendment that would have prohibited "Social Security benefits for illegal aliens."

Seeking to set himself apart, Laffey said he favors an enforcement-first approach with current immigration laws and views any "amnesty" program as a "slap in the face to hard-working Americans and Mexicans who are waiting to enter this country legally."

In response, Chafee campaign manager Ian Lang said: "I think Steve Laffey is trying to be all things to all people and he is all over the place."

Lang said the expansion of the Davis-Bacon Act "was brought in as a compromise to get the bill through," and Chafee viewed it as "part and parcel" of a bipartisan compromise that would increase fencing along the border, authorize the deployment of the National Guard and provide a pathway to citizenship.

On Social Security benefits, he said, Chafee indeed supports "the principle that people who have worked and paid into the system for years should be able to get the benefits they paid for" after the payment of back taxes and a fine qualifies them for citizenship.

Chafee's own mailer says Laffey's get-tough rhetoric now is at odds with his February 2005 suggestion on talk radio that "we should recruit illegal labor at the border," and his well-publicized April 2005 announcement that Cranston would accept identification cards issued by the embassies of Guatemala and Mexico as legal identification. Chafee called them: "illegal immigration cards."

The cards themselves are not proof of legal immigration status or eligibility to work in the United States. But they are often accepted by American banks from foreigners seeking to open an account, and an advocate for Mexican Americans said they are also invaluable when Mexicans come into contact with the police.

But critics argue that the cards legitimize the presence of illegal immigrants and provide an avenue for terrorists to transfer money and enter the United States. The Chafee camp produced a copy of the warnings, in that vein, from an FBI administrator.

But Laffey spokeswoman Nachama Soloveichik accused Chafee of distorting the mayor's Feb. 25, 2005, remarks on WPRO radio. As reported at the time, he suggested "encouraging American companies such as Wal-Mart to go directly to the border [to] recruit workers from among those crossing and allow them two-to-three-year visas."

"Nowhere in the article does Mayor Laffey say he supports recruiting illegal immigrants," she said. "Rather, Mayor Laffey said he would support a guest-worker program after the country secured its borders and enforced its laws . . . much like the legal guest-worker programs we have today. "

She labeled Chafee's comments about the immigrant identification cards as "Chafee Lie #2," but then said: "Mayor Laffey accepted the use of matricular consular cards at the urging of the Cranston chief of police in order to enhance the security of the city's police force and the citizens they work to protect. This way, when a Cranston policeman engages an individual in a routine traffic stop, the officer is able to identify who the individual is and whether he constitutes a security risk.

"In addition, the Treasury Department accepts consular cards as a legitimate form of identification with respect to monitoring illegal financial transactions."

kgregg@projo.com / (401) 277-7078