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April 15, 2002, Monday, Final Edition

SECTION: A SECTION; Pg. A19

LENGTH: 722 words

HEADLINE: Some Detect GOP Hypocrisy on Hispanics

BYLINE: John Lancaster, Washington Post Staff Writer

BODY:

Senate GOP leaders caused a stir last week when they accused Democrats of anti-Hispanic bias, allegedly for delaying action on Bush judicial nominee Miguel A. Estrada. But some Latino groups say they detect a whiff of hypocrisy in the air.

On the same day Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) accused Democrats of blocking Estrada's nomination "because he's Hispanic," House Republican members of a conference committee on the farm bill rejected a White House-backed proposal to restore food stamp benefits to legal immigrants.

Resurrecting the benefits, which are funded under the farm bill, has been "a top priority" of the Latino community for years, according to Cecelia Mun oz of the National Council of La Raza, the nation's largest Latino civil rights organization. She accused GOP lawmakers of "trying to get mileage out of framing themselves as pro-Latino in the places they are most visible, and this Estrada thing was the best example. But behind the scenes, the House Republicans acted in unison to undercut both what the White House is trying to accomplish and what we're trying to accomplish."

Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Tex.), chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, accused President Bush of showing "a lack of leadership on this issue."

Hundreds of thousands of legal immigrants lost their food stamp benefits under terms of the 1996 welfare reform law. Bush, who is eager to improve his party's standing among Latino voters, had proposed restoring benefits for legal immigrants who have spent at least five years in the United States, a change that would add about 360,000 people to food stamp rolls. But House Republicans negotiating the final shape of the farm bill objected, putting forward a more limited restoration.

Rep. Robert W. Goodlatte (R-Va.) said the measure would restore food stamps for deserving legal immigrants, including children, while remaining true to the goals of the welfare reform law signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996. Charges of hypocrisy, he said, come from those who "are trying to inject a broader political agenda here. We're trying to address specific problems."

White House spokesman Ken Lisaius said Bush remains committed to Estrada and to his original food stamp proposal, noting that the measure is in his budget. "I think that sends a very powerful signal as to where he stands on the issue," he said.

WHO'S AN ENVIRO? The Sierra Club is angry over what it regards as treasonous behavior by a former top official with the organization.

Last week, an ad in The Washington Post quoted Douglas P. Wheeler, who served as the Sierra Club's executive director from 1985 to 1987, expressing support for oil drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The ad was sponsored by the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, or CREA, a political group backed in part by the chemical and mining industries.

"Think All Environmentalists Oppose President Bush's Energy Plan?" the ad asked. "Think Again . . ."

The ad quoted Wheeler as saying, "The exploration and development of energy resources in the United States is governed by the world's most stringent environmental constraints, and to force development elsewhere is to accept the inevitability of less rigorous oversight."

That did not sit well with Wheeler's former employer, which issued a news release saying Wheeler's views "do not represent the Sierra Club or its more than 700,000 members, who oppose drilling in the Arctic National Refuge."

"When he uses his former title, he's clearly attempting to take advantage of our name on an issue which he knows we disagree with him on," Carl Pope, the Sierra Club's current executive director, said in an interview. "It confuses the public."

Wheeler, a Republican who raised eyebrows by announcing at his first Sierra Club news conference that he had voted for Ronald Reagan, later served as vice president of the World Wildlife Fund and as California's secretary for natural resources; he now practices environmental law at Hogan & Hartson. He did not return two phone messages seeking comment.

THE WEEK AHEAD: The Senate will consider border security legislation and a GOP proposal to allow oil drilling in the Arctic refuge. The House takes up the Child Custody Protection Act.

LOAD-DATE: April 15, 2002