The special election to replace Rep. Peter T. Ginaitt, D-Warwick, may not have garnered much media attention, but it’s caught the eye and the checkbooks of House leaders.

Chief among them is Majority Leader Gordon D Fox, D-Providence, who bucked the trend of party leaders, overlooking endorsed primary candidate Edgar N. Ladouceur to contribute $250 to Frank G. Ferri.

Speaker William J. Murphy, meanwhile, gave $300 to Ladouceur.

Ferri breezed to victory in the primary. He will face Republican Jonathan Wheeler and independent Carlo Pisaturo in the special election on Nov. 27.

Fox says he’s been in contact with the Ferri campaign “working on some strategies” leading up to next week’s special election and says he’s donated more money since the last round of campaign finance reports was filed.

“Frank and I have worked together on a lot of issues and I know him quite well. He’s a very decent person. He’s likable, he’s articulate and he’s the guy I’d like to see replace Peter Ginaitt at the State House,” Fox told Political Scene.

Ferri, best known for his role as the head of the gay-rights group Marriage Equality RI, was a familiar face at the State House in the days of last year’s gay marriage bill, which Fox co-sponsored.

Ferri, like Fox, is openly gay.

Fox said he’s also worked with Ferri on health-care issues, the centerpiece of the Ferri’s campaign.

What of going against the party leadership to support an unendorsed candidate?

“I’m the Democratic majority leader so when you have an endorsement process go forward, you always wonder, do you want to go with the endorsed candidate? That means something to me, so I don’t take it lightly that I support the unendorsed candidate,” Fox said.

But in the end, he said, Ferri seemed like the best man for the job.

The Ferri campaign was quick to add it’s also captured Murphy’s support in the days since the primary victory. House spokesman Larry Berman confirmed that.

Cabinet post for Carcieri?

Does Governor Carcieri have a personal stake in the 2008 presidential nomination?

The governor’s communication director, Steve Kass, thinks so.

Speaking on talk radio earlier in the month, Kass, a former talk-radio host, said Republican Mitt Romney would give Carcieri a cabinet position should Romney win the presidency.

The comment came as Kass was complaining that Carcieri’s credentials as an education leader were largely being ignored in Rhode Island.

“I look in the mirror each morning and I say, “Does anybody in this state know he’s national leader in education?” Kass said to Dan Yorke on WPRO-AM (630). “Does anybody know that? That the other governors of America, all of them, elected him as cochair to be their point person on education? Do they know that if Governor Romney got elected, that I hear talk about that he would appoint the governor as secretary of education? They think that much of his expertise and what he’s accomplished.”

The Romney campaign last week deflected questions on Kass’ comments to Carcieri’s office, which downplayed the suggestion that Carcieri would leave office for a cabinet position under Romney.

The governor’s spokesman, Jeff Neal, was left to spin his way out of the latest eyebrow-raising comments to leave Kass’ mouth (Kass made headlines last week after telling a newspaper reporter the governor had no plans to fill the director of revenue position. The comments were printed the same day Carcieri appointed Gary Sasse, executive director of the business-backed Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council, to the position.)

“Steve Kass recalls stating that he had heard rumors that people were suggesting that, given Governor Carcieri’s national standing on education policy issues, it would be natural that Governor Romney would consider him as a candidate for education secretary in a Romney administration,” Neal told Political Scene. “However, Governor Carcieri has had no contact with Governor Romney’s campaign on this subject. Governor Carcieri would obviously be very flattered if asked, but right now he’s very happy being governor of Rhode Island.”

And what about Kass’ comment that Carcieri was the “point person on education” for America’s governors?

Neal said that Carcieri is a a cochairman of the National Governors Association’s committee on the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act.

Lincoln polling positive for Saturday elections

Lincoln voters sent two messages in the town’s nonbinding special election earlier in the month.

Aside from telling state lawmakers they opposed plans to expand gambling operations at Twin River, the residents also registered strong support for Saturday elections.

Turnout for the election — believed to be the only Saturday contest in state history — was considered very strong, especially for a nonelection-year nonbinding referendum. Almost 20 percent of the town’s registered voters showed up.

Volunteers from the secretary of state’s office conducted exit interviews at Lincoln’s four polling places that produced widespread support for weekend elections.

All together, 95 percent of voters asked said they liked Saturday voting. The most common reason was that they didn’t have to leave work for the election — usually held Tuesdays; the second most popular reason was that it was generally “more convenient,” according to secretary of state spokesman Chris Barnett.

In all, 733 voters participated in the exit polling; 546 liked Saturday voting; 27 disliked Saturday voting; 160 had no opinion.

Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis told Political Scene that he would introduce a bill in the coming legislative session to open polls Tuesdays and Saturdays.

“Our goal is to make it easier to vote. If this will make people more likely to vote, it’s something we need to do,” Mollis said. “This legislation’s time has come and I look forward to introducing it.”

There are two potential obstacles, Mollis said, that his office is studying. The first is cost — he could not immediately provide estimates; the second is “ensuring the integrity of the election — the safety of the ballots from Tuesday to Saturday.”

DBR’s Greer joins governor’s legal staff

Jeffrey J. Greer, the Department of Business Regulation’s associate director of commercial licensing and racing and athletics, has a new, $108,625-a-year role in the Carcieri administration: deputy legal counsel to the governor.

He recently was appointed to the post Claire Richards vacated the same day Carcieri announced that failed lieutenant governor candidate Kernan “Kerry” King would succeed Andrew Hodgkin as executive counsel. Richards’ tenure had stretched back to the Almond administration.

Greer, once described in a headline as “thick-skinned, chatty,” did not respond to inquiries late last week, and it could not immediately be determined if and when the administration plans to fill his former job as the head of a division at DBR that regulates gas-pump pricing and signs, auto wrecking, auctioneers, bedding and upholstery, mobile homes and the “sin industries” — boxing, liquor sales and distribution, and licensing issues at Lincoln Park. At one point, Greer called his unit “the kitchen sink division.”

During a tense budget hearing last April, House Finance Chairman Steven M. Costantino injected a bit of levity with a comment about the new collar-grazing hairstyle of Greer, who had previously appeared before him with a shorter coif more typical of an attorney and government bureaucrat.

Greer told Costantino, “When you’re the liquor, racing and boxing commissioner, you have to appeal to your clientele.”

Meanwhile, his new boss, King, is still actively involved in party politics. As chairman of the RI GOP Anchors Club, he is co-hosting with GOP Chairman Giovanni Cicione and the GOP’s fundraising chairman, Joseph. B. White, a breakfast this week featuring Randy Bumps, Northeast political director of the Republican National Committee.

The GOP Web site says this about these big-dollar donors: “As an Anchor, members [receive] admittance into all RI GOP events. They are the backbone of the Party, providing the highest level of financial support.”

Roberts endorses Clinton

Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts has joined most other top Democrats in endorsing the presidential candidacy of New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

“Hillary Clinton’s 35-year record fighting for children and families makes her uniquely qualified to lead this country from her first day in the White House,” Roberts said. “She has the strength and experience and vision to provide quality, affordable health insurance to every American.”

Most of the state’s other leading elected Democrats have endorsed the Clinton campaign, including Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Congressman James R. Langevin, Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch, General Treasurer Frank Caprio, Providence Mayor David Cicilline and House Speaker William Murphy, D-West Warwick.

Sen. Jack Reed has yet to endorse any presidential candidate and Rep. Patrick Kennedy is supporting his fellow Providence College alum, Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd, who is close to Kennedy’s father, Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy.

Roberts said she did not attend the Nov. 9 Clinton fundraiser in East Greenwich because she and her husband, Thomas Roberts, were in Rome celebrating the couple’s 25th wedding anniversary. “I would have been there if it hadn’t been for our anniversary.”

Indiana’s Bayh to stump for Clinton

On the fundraising circuit, two upcoming Democratic events: On Dec. 3, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh will be the featured speaker at an event for Clinton at the Warwick home of Democratic activists Don and Sheri Sweitzer.

Tickets are a minimum of $500.

On Dec. 7, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee will scoop up some Rhode Island campaign money at an event at the East Greenwich home of Mark and Susan Weiner. The minimum for that fundraiser is $1,000. Rhode Island Senators Reed and Whitehouse will host and may be accompanied by other Senate Democrats.

smackay@projo.com