Feinstein Worker Entered U.S. Legally, but Visa Lapsed : Politics: INS records indicate no violation of federal law. Huffington continues to make the hiring an issue.

After several wild days of accusations and retractions in the fiercely contested U.S. Senate race, the Immigration and Naturalization Service confirmed Friday that the woman employed by U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein as a housekeeper in the early 1980s entered the country with a legal work permit that expired while she was working for Feinstein.

The INS records suggested no violation of federal law by Feinstein, but show that the housekeeper apparently remained in the country illegally while working for Feinstein. The records also show that the woman’s work visa limited her to working at the Guatemalan Consulate.

The records appeared to buttress claims by Feinstein that she did not hire an illegal immigrant and that the woman had some documentation--a visa--at the time of her employment. If the woman had presented that documentation to an employer, it would have been virtually impossible for anyone but an immigration expert to recognize the restrictions, an INS official said Friday.

Meanwhile, Republican challenger Mike Huffington left no doubt he would use the fact that the woman’s work permit expired in November, 1980--and that she was technically eligible to work only at the consulate--to continue to attack Feinstein.

Huffington had been on the defensive for more than a week after it was revealed that he and his wife had employed an illegal immigrant nanny until last year, apparently violating immigration and tax laws. Even though the circumstances of Feinstein’s hiring in the early 1980s differed significantly from those of Huffington, the distinction was likely to be blurred in the final days of the bitter campaign that is the most expensive ever waged for a congressional seat.

The immigration issue was only one of a series of events in the Senate race Friday:

* In another sign of the race’s volatility, KNBC-TV released a poll that showed Feinstein with a 16-point lead over Huffington, up 10 points from a poll two weeks ago. The 52%-36% margin came only days after another poll, done by a local television station, showed Huffington with a 2-point lead over Feinstein. KNBC attributed its results to Huffington’s recent disclosure about employing an illegal immigrant for more than four years.

* Entering the last frantic weekend of campaigning, Feinstein traveled to several cities while Huffington concentrated on Los Angeles, with several television appearances. On a local cable television program, he called Feinstein a “hypocrite” and accused the INS of a “cover-up,” though he offered no proof.

* Campaign disclosure reports showed that Huffington gave another $500,000 to his campaign, raising the total to nearly $28 million, which sets a national spending record for a congressional race. Feinstein loaned her campaign $70,000, bringing its total close to $11 million.

* The Associated Press asked the Huffington campaign to withdraw a new commercial attacking Feinstein because, the wire service said, it was quoted erroneously in the ad. The Huffington campaign refused the request.

The illegal immigrant accusations frustrated Feinstein’s effort to draw attention to her record of bipartisan support in cities and counties. In news conferences in Fresno and Sacramento, she maintained that the woman she hired as a housekeeper in 1980 presented documentation showing that she was in the United States legally. Late in the day, her campaign also released W-2 statements showing that Feinstein paid taxes and Social Security for the housekeeper.

Campaigning in Sacramento, Feinstein said: “Never in the history of this nation has there been a race like this where one person with no record and no performance . . . has spent so much to attack and slander.”

Repeating a recent theme of her campaign, Feinstein implored her supporters to turn back Huffington’s expensive campaign. “A Senate seat cannot be bought. A Senate seat must be earned. And the way you earn it is by performing,” she said.

Feinstein ended her day of campaigning with a rally at Los Angeles City Hall with President Clinton.

Even before the INS disclosure Friday it was clear that Feinstein’s hiring occurred long before the 1986 federal law that made it a crime to hire illegal immigrants. But throughout the day, Huffington accused Feinstein of lying about her former housekeeper’s status and violating an obscure California labor law by hiring the housekeeper.

The housekeeper was quoted by Associated Press on Friday as insisting she was in the country legally. “Yes, I was legal. I already talked with her (Feinstein) and I am not going to say anything more,” she said.

At the San Francisco house where the woman now works as a housekeeper, her husband told The Times that she had entered the country legally and was permitted to work at the time she was employed by Feinstein. Miguel Realegeno disputed Huffington’s ads saying that his wife was an illegal worker.

Richard Kenney, an INS spokesman in Washington, said a woman identified as Annabella del Rosario Legrand-Cabrera Realegeno, 44, entered the United States on Nov. 17, 1979, on a one-year visa that allowed her to work for the Guatemalan Consulate in San Francisco. He said that visa was good until Nov. 16, 1980--months after Feinstein has said she hired the woman.

Kenney said INS records show that the woman’s work authorization was limited to employment at the Guatemalan Consulate. But Kenney said it would have been very difficult for someone who was not an expert to determine what its limitations were.

Although the INS said the records did not suggest any violation of the law, the Huffington campaign said the information showed that Feinstein employed an illegal worker and that this constituted a violation of state law.

But the California labor code only prohibits an employer from “knowingly” hiring an illegal immigrant and nothing the Huffington campaign said on Friday undercut Feinstein’s contention that she thought the woman had proper documentation when she hired her.

“As I’ve said, this was back in 1980, the person in question handed me documentation,” Feinstein told reporters as she campaigned in Northern California. “It looked verifiable to me. And I hired her.”

The Feinstein campaign called on television stations to stop running the Huffington ad on the issue, saying it was “potentially libelous.” In a letter to the stations, campaign manager Kam Kuwata noted that Associated Press has challenged the accuracy of the ad.

Associated Press San Francisco bureau chief Dan Day, who faxed a letter of protest to the Huffington campaign Thursday night, said Friday the news service was asking that the ad be pulled.

“The erroneous information in your ad can substantially damage (Associated Press’s) reputation. Please confirm to me that you will discontinue this misrepresentation of the AP’s reporting,” Day wrote.

In other developments this week:

* A Senate ethics complaint filed Friday contends that Feinstein would have personally benefited from her efforts to allegedly influence the Justice and Agriculture departments to drop 34 civil fraud suits against Sunkist Growers and its members.

Feinstein wrote officials this year, supporting dismissal of the whistle-blower suits, which seek $80 million to $400 million from Sunkist Growers for violating federal quotas on citrus shipments, the complaint said.

The complaint alleges that Feinstein held an interest in Newhall Land and Farming, which grows oranges and lemons for Sunkist--based on Feinstein’s 1992 financial disclosure statement showing an investment of $500,000 to $1 million.

Her 1993 disclosure lists the investment at less than $1,000, however. Richard Blum, Feinstein’s husband, said one of his partnerships divested the Newhall asset in September, 1993.

The ethics complaint was filed by James Moody, an attorney for Sequoia Orange Co., the firm that filed the whistle-blower suit against Sunkist.

Ethics experts said Feinstein’s letters appear to fall within Senate rules. Hadley Roff, Feinstein’s staff director in California, said her letters were proper.

The Justice Department in September sought dismissal of the Sunkist case, despite having previously intervened on behalf of Sequoia. A spokesman said Feinstein’s letter played no part in the decision.

* State tax officials have questioned a former bookkeeper for the Huffington family as they opened a preliminary inquiry to determine if sales taxes of about $6,250 were paid on furnishings for the candidate’s Montecito mansion.

The inquiry was prompted by the claim of bookkeeper Claudia Bratton that Huffington’s wife, Arianna, purchased at least $100,000 worth of chairs, draperies and other items with a tax card issued to her sister, Agapi Stassinopoulos, by the State Board of Equalization.

The card allows interior designers to buy items from wholesalers without paying sales tax, if the goods are to be resold. But if the items are for personal use, the cardholder must pay the tax.

Bratton’s lawyer said his client is merely reporting what she saw while working for Arianna Huffington during several months in 1990. Jennifer Grossman, a spokeswoman for the Huffington campaign, denounced the assertions as “outrageous” and said Stassinopoulos had paid all the required sales taxes. Bryan G. Gaggs, an accountant who worked for Stassinopoulos, said he believes “all returns were filed on a timely basis, and that full compliance with California sales tax laws was effected.”

Also contributing to this story were Times staff writers Dave Lesher and Greg Krikorian in Los Angeles, Mark Gladstone and Virginia Ellis in Sacramento and Ralph Vartabedian in Washington.