CHAFEE

PROVIDENCE — Declaring that he’s “back in the saddle again” after his bruising 2006 defeat, former U.S. Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee on Monday took the first official step in a likely 2010 run for governor as an independent.

As pundits across the political spectrum debated his chances of winning the state’s top political prize, the Republican-turned-independent filed notice with the state Board of Elections that he had created an exploratory campaign committee, headed by James DeRentis, a former executive vice president and chief business officer at BankRI.

He listed his new e-mail address as: chafeeforgovernor@gmail.com.

And while stopping short of a full-blown announcement for the job his father, the late John H. Chafee, held as a Republican in the 1960s, the 56-year-old former farrier, Warwick city councilman and mayor of Rhode Island’s second-largest city described himself as “the only potential gubernatorial contender that possesses governmental experience on the local, national and international level … [He] knows how to make the day-to-day leadership decisions that constitute a well-run government.”

In his long-awaited announcement, Chafee said he would “spend the next several months meeting with advisers and supporters putting together a plan that will lay the groundwork for an independent campaign for governor in 2010.”

“The time has come to stop the political bickering and start using our collective expertise to make the kinds of bold decisions that will position Rhode Island as a model of economic, civic and social success, not a state in decline,” he said.

With Republican Governor Carcieri barred by term limits from running again, the prospect of an open seat in 2010 has Democrats licking their chops at a chance to capture a seat that has been in GOP hands since Bruce G. Sundlun lost his bid for reelection in 1994.

Democrats dominate the state’s congressional delegation, the General Assembly and all but one of the top five state offices, but the majority of Rhode Island voters are, in fact, “unaffiliated.” As of April 1, 291,355 registered voters identified themselves as Democrats (41.9 percent), 73,697 as Republicans (10.6 percent) and 330,543 (47.5 percent) as unaffiliated with either party, according to the secretary of state.

Asked on Monday to assess an independent Chafee candidacy, former Brown University political science professor and pollster Darrell West said “he’s got a good shot” because “he is well known, well liked and likely to be well funded, and that distinguishes him from most independents who are unknown and poorly funded.”

With a profile as a fiscal conservative and a social liberal, West reasoned, Chafee should also “be able to draw from both sides of the political aisle,” especially if the Democrats and Republicans place more conservative candidates on the tickets. In the current atmosphere of “discontentment and dissatisfaction with the status quo,” he said, “the time is ripe for something like this … If the state is going to make history, this is exactly the time when it happens.”

But state Republican Chairman Giovanni Cicione bitterly recalled Chafee’s endorsing Democrat Barack Obama an hour before the eventual Republican presidential nominee, John McCain — who had campaigned for Chafee in 2006 — landed in Rhode Island for a campaign event. After that, “I don’t think anyone in the party has any real interest in supporting his candidacy,” Cicione said.

And state Democratic Chairman William Lynch sought on Monday to play down the significance of Chafee’s entry into a race for an open seat that may very well include the chairman’s brother, Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch; Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts and General Treasurer Frank Caprio.

“Clearly, Linc Chafee has some name recognition, and apparently a lot of money, both of which are helpful in politics,” Lynch said. “But we saw just two years ago that it wasn’t enough for him to hold onto a seat as an incumbent senator, so I don’t believe for a minute that a Democrat is not going to be able to win the governor’s race, even against a Linc Chafee.”

In 2006, despite exit polls showing his job approval rating above 60 percent, Chafee lost the U.S. Senate seat that had been in his family name for three decades to Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse, after beating the more conservative Cranston Mayor Stephen P. Laffey in a GOP primary. His own defeat was pivotal in the Democrats’ capture of control of the U.S. Senate.

One of the most persistent Republican critics of President George W. Bush’s foreign policies when he was in Washington, and the only Republican to vote against the Iraq war, Chafee wrote a book titled Against the Tide: How a Compliant Congress Empowered a Reckless President in which he attributed his defeat to voters making the right decision.

“While defeat is never easy, I give the voters credit: They made the connection between electing even popular Republicans at the cost of leaving the Senate in the hands of a leadership they had learned to mistrust,” he wrote.

Politically “homeless” since disaffiliating from the GOP, Chafee said he “thought of all the different options — Libertarian, Green, Progressive, Moderate,” before deciding to launch his campaign as an independent.

On Monday, Rep. Joseph Trillo, R-Warwick — the only other Republican publicly weighing a run for governor — said he welcomed a Chafee candidacy because his liberal views and union-negotiating history when he was mayor of Warwick are likely to siphon off potential Democratic votes which “helps me.” While Chafee might say “he worked with the unions,” Trillo said, he “accommodated” them.

kgregg@projo.com