A Republican on the Edge

Once he arrived in Washington, the new senator kept a low profile, sometimes darting through hallways and speaking in a diffident, even cryptic style. His colleagues and reporters found him difficult to read. For instance, on the Medicare prescription drug bill, Chafee voted in November 2003 for and against different versions of the bill. He opposed the new benefit on final passage but now is getting hammered by both Laffey and his Democratic opponents for having no clear stance on the issue.

But Chafee also can be strong-willed and immovable once he makes up his mind. He shrugged off pressure from the GOP and voted against tax cuts and an energy bill packed with oil industry incentives. He was the only Senate Republican to oppose the Iraq war resolution. His greatest act of blasphemy was voting against Bush in the 2004 election. Instead, Chafee wrote in the president's father, former president George H.W. Bush.

Despite his political transgressions, the GOP establishment is backing Chafee as the party's best bet of holding the seat. "Bush and his crowd, they're all working for him," said Whitehouse. "He can't have it both ways."

Many in Rhode Island assume Chafee is motivated by the legacy of his father, but another influence that the senator cites is the "Independent Man," the 11-foot-tall gilded figure that stands atop the State House dome in Providence, representing Rhode Island's founding principles of political and religious freedom.

"Average voters here don't want an extreme," said James Hagan, retired president of the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce. Hagan is helping to put together Business Leaders for Chafee, part of the hybrid get-out-the-vote effort that is also mobilizing women's groups, environmentalists and community leaders. "At least he wrestles and considers," says Jonathan K. Farnum, president of Wardwell Braiding Machine Co., a Republican who is helping Hagan form the business leaders group.

Laffey, 43, energetic and ebullient, is Chafee's political opposite. Although he became wealthy working for a Memphis-based financial services company, he grew up as a lower-middle-class Cranston kid. The Chafee family drives two Toyota Prius hybrid cars, but Laffey bought a huge RV so he can tool around the state campaigning with his five children. He and a platoon of campaign volunteers, many of them friends from childhood, blitz through neighborhoods and coffee shops and wave signs for commuters at the crack of dawn.

Although Laffey raised taxes as Cranston mayor -- a heretical act for a conservative Republican in Washington -- he is admired for having turned around a troubled city, including by bucking powerful unions and even a platoon of highly paid school crossing guards. State and national Republican leaders strongly urged him to run for lieutenant governor, but Laffey believes his financial management skills can be put to better use in Washington. "I'm not into that," Laffey said of the intraparty pressure. "I'm an outsider. I'm running against what's going on down there."

At least some Rhode Island Republicans agree: the Scituate Republican Town Committee. The group decided to back Laffey the morning after Chafee's appearance.