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By Cynthia Needham
PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Former Sen. Lincoln Chafee said Tuesday that Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter's decision to switch political parties demonstrates the escalating struggle moderate Republicans face as the GOP moves further right.
"In a way, I wasn't surprised. He and I share some of the same battle scars," Chafee said in an interview hours after Specter made his surprise announcement.
Some in Washington have speculated that Specter's decision to become a Democrat was directly tied to a difficult Republican primary fight he was expecting in 2010 against Pat Toomey, founder of the ardently conservative Club for Growth.
It was Club for Growth that helped fund Rhode Island Republican Stephen P. Laffey's unsuccessful primary run against Chafee in 2006. Chafee, wounded by the bruising primary, lost his seat in the general election to Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse.
Specter said he was switching parties because the Republicans had moved too far to the right and his views were now more aligned with the Democrats.
Chafee, who left the Republican party and now is considering a run for governor as an independent, was frank about the comparisons between him and Specter.
"I witnessed it first hand. It made no political sense and it is that kind of thinking that is taking the Republican party down..," he said. "It's a pattern of zealots within the party, particularly on the fundraising side...They raise millions to go after someone like me or like Senator Specter, hanging on by our fingernails in a blue state and making a hard job impossible."
The former Rhode Island Senator's strongest memories of Specter in Washington offer a striking example of that growing hostility.
Each Wednesday during the years they served, the two men had lunch together in the Senate dining room, eating alongside fellow moderate Republicans.
The longstanding lunch date had once boasted more than a dozen unofficial invitees, but by the time Chafee arrived in 1999, the guest list had dwindled to five: James Jeffords of Vermont, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, both of Maine, Specter and Chafee.
When Jeffords disaffiliated in 2001, the list dropped to four. It now stands at just two.
"The party is not changing, they are not learning from all of this. We've seen a huge wipeout in the Senate," Chafee said. "You'd think they'd want to change direction as they slip deeper and deeper into the minority and that's just not happening. They went after Arlen Specter in a blue state primary and look what happened, he just walked across the aisle."
