DSCC trumpets Mariana Islands legislation

As President Bush signed a bill extending US labor and immigration laws to the US-governed Mariana Islands, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in a press release today blasted US Senate candidate Bob Schaffer for his role in allegedly helping a now-jailed former lobbyist prevent such legislation while Schaffer served in the US House of Representatives.

Schaffer campaign manager, Dick Wadhams, countered that Schaffer's opponent never even inquired about labor conditions in the Mariana Islands while serving in the US House at the time.

Schaffer is the Republican candidate running against Democrat Mark Udall to replace retiring US Senator Wayne Allard.

"The exploitation of workers on the Mariana Islands comes to a close today, but only because Congress finally rejected attempts by jailed lobbyist Jack Abramoff and his crony Bob Schaffer to allow the human rights abuses to continue," DSCC spokesman Matthew Miller said in the release.

Schaffer took a fact finding trip paid for by Abramoff in 1999 to the Mariana Islands. Under Congressional rules, such trips are legal. However, a widely circulated picture of Schaffer and his wife on a boat getting ready to parasail during the trip, along with allegations of labor abuse in the islands, has contributed to the impression of complicity by Schaffer in another congressional scandal.

"Now that an overwhelming bipartisan majority and the president have endorsed this reform," continues the DSCC release, "maybe Bob Schaffer will apologize for his shameful assistance of a corrupt lobbyist who was helping the factories exploit their workers."

Schaffer has said that he's done nothing wrong and has never met Abramoff.

The Rocky Mountain News reported that Schaffer's trip included viewing "a number of factories during his four-day free trip" apparently to inspect working conditions and human rights abuses.

"We found varying conditions," Schaffer told the Rocky's Lynn Bartels. "We found some unsafe working environments and some were very well run."

Schaffer campaign manager Dick Wadhams says the charges all smack of politics and hypocrisy: "Despite Boulder Liberal Udall's claim how concerned he was about alleged labor abuse," Wadhams told the Inside Edge, "he never went to a single Resources Committee hearing on the subject nor did he ever make a floor statement about it."