PROVIDENCE
-- Sen. Lincoln Chafee won't commit to vote against the massive budget
reconciliation bill now working its way through Congress and that is
causing apprehension among groups that are usually friendly to him.
The Sierra Club, Ocean State Action, Rhode Islanders for Social and
Economic Security (RISES) and Council 94, AFSCME, were among the
organizations that called a Statehouse news conference Wednesday to
urge Chafee to vote no on the measure they called "anti-environment,
anti-student, anti-consumer and anti-working family."
It is scheduled for a Senate vote today.
"Truthfully,
Sen. Chafee's lack of a public statement on the reconciliation bill has
made us nervous about the stand he will take when this comes up for a
vote," said Karen Malcolm of Ocean State Action. "We can say we will be
tremendously disappointed if the senator votes for this bad bill
because this is about supporting the Bush administration's bad budget
scheme."
"Sen.
Chafee cannot walk the line on this as he has done in the past,"
Malcolm said, pointing to a procedural vote Chafee made on a Medicare
bill last year. "We don't want to see that happen again."
"Our
position is that a vote for the Senate budget reconciliation bill is a
vote for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a vote for
$9.9 billion in cuts to Medicaid and Medicare and it is a vote for
$13.7 billionin cuts to the student loan program."
Calling
Chafee "a voice of moderation in an increasingly polarized Senate,"
Jennifer Tuttle of the Sierra Club said, "We are calling on Senator
Chafee to reject this budget because we deserve better. Drilling in the
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge will not save Americans money at the
pump, it will not put a dent in our dependence on foreign oil and it
will do nothing to strengthen national security, What it will do is
ruin one of America’s last unspoiled wild places for what government
officials call a few months of oil that won't be available for a
decade."
Chafee
is the lone Republican in the state's congressional delegation. The
other three members, Sen. Jack Reed and Reps. Patrick Kennedy and Jim
Langevin, all Democrats, oppose the reconciliation bill.
Chafee
Press Secretary Steve Hourahan said the bill, still being debated on
Wednesday, is not in its final form so Chafee has not decided how he
will vote on the spending cuts in the tax bill. He said Chafee is going
to oppose the $70 million in tax cuts contained in the bill.
"The senator is clearly hearing from a lot of groups" about the budget bill, Hourahan said.
He
said Chafee has always opposed drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge, called ANWAR, but is "pleased that the Medicare and Medicaid
cuts are not as draconian in the Senate bill" as they are in the House
version.
There
will probably be an effort to strike the ANWAR provision from the bill,
Hourahan said, "but there is little expectation that we have the votes"
to eliminate it.
Hourahan
said no Senate Democrats are expected to vote for the bill, but with
Chafee, "there is no party line; he will vote on how it affects Rhode
Island and how it affects people who benefit" from the programs being
cut.
Jim
Cenerini, legislative affairs coordinator for Council 94, said, "These
Medicaid cuts, projected up to $10 billion, would be absolutely
devastating to some of the most vulnerable populations in Rhode Island."
If
the cuts go through, Cenerini noted, Rhode Island could lose $55.8
million in federal matching funds, in the Food Stamp program, Rhode
Island could stand to lose $13.4 million. TANF, a cash assistance
program; SSI (Supplemental Security Income, a program for the
permanently disabled), and other programs could lose a combined $26.5
million.
