Lincoln Chafee - Post-Senate Activities

Post-Senate Activities

In December 2006, Chafee announced he was accepting a fellowship to serve as a "distinguished visiting fellow" at Brown University's Thomas J. Watson Jr. Institute for International Studies. The university had Chafee leading a student group studying U.S. foreign policy.

In the September of 2007, Chafee officially left the Republican Party, changing his affiliation to independent. He said that he did so because of the Republicans' increasing conservatism, and particularly cited spending cuts in programs which assisted the middle- and low-income people, such as Pell Grants and Head Start. In February 2008, he said he was considering voting for Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential primary. On February 14, with the Rhode Island Democratic primary approaching in three weeks, Chafee officially endorsed Obama. He is currently one of 35 co-chairs selected to "act as key surrogates and ambassadors" for Obama's re-election campaign.

In 2008, Chafee joined the advisory board of J Street, a lobbying group that promotes diplomatic relations between Israel and its neighbors, and supports an independent Palestinian state.

In September 2008, Chafee received media attention for describing Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska and the Republican vice-presidential nominee in the 2008 United States presidential election, as a "cocky wacko".