MIAMI (AP) -- The spokesman for the Miami relatives of 6-year-old Elian
                  Gonzalez acknowledged Tuesday that he worked in the 1998 election
                  campaign of the judge who awarded temporary custody of the Cuban boy
                  to the child's great-uncle.

                  A check of campaign records by CNN showed that Armando Gutierrez
                  was paid $10,000 as a political consultant to Family Court Judge Rosa
                  Rodriguez.

                  "I see no conflict," Gutierrez told CNN. "This had nothing to do with her
                  choice, with her being chosen in this case. I had no contact with her."

                  The family court director, Celina Rios, released a statement later in the day
                  saying that Gutierrez' role as a campaign consultant and the fees he was paid
                  are a matter of public record.

                  Rodriguez was under no obligation, the statement said, to "disclose the
                  participation of any individual in a past campaign who is not an attorney and
                  not a party in a pending legal matter before her."

                  Rodriguez, who is Puerto Rican, ruled Monday that Elian should stay in the
                  custody of his great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez, until a hearing on the matter
                  scheduled for March 6.

                  Gutierrez said he had not spoken to the judge since two days after her
                  election. Gutierrez also said Rodriguez is just one of hundreds of political
                  candidates he has worked for, as many as 20 at a time.

                  "I feel very comfortable with it," he said.

                  Dispute over jurisdiction

                  Elian was rescued Thanksgiving Day clinging to
                  an inner tube in the Atlantic Ocean off the
                  coast of Florida. His mother and stepfather
                  were among 10 people who drowned when
                  their boat sank as they tried to reach Florida.

                  The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization
                  Service ruled last week that Juan Miguel
                  Gonzalez, the boy's father, is the only person
                  able to speak for him in immigration matters.
                  INS officials said the boy should be returned to
                  the father, who lives in Cuba, by this Friday.

                  Attorneys for the INS and the Justice
                  Department on Tuesday were working on a response to the state ruling.
                  State court rulings normally cannot override the actions of federal agencies.
                  One option the lawyers considered was asking a federal court to rule on the
                  issue of jurisdiction.

                  Federal authorities said they have no intention of trying to physically take the
                  boy into custody during the dispute.

                  Attorney General Janet Reno is the ultimate authority on custody issues
                  involving migrant children unaccompanied by adults, said David Abraham, a
                  law professor at the University of Miami. Reno supports the INS decision to
                  return Elian to his father by January 14.

                  "According to the well-established supremacy doctrine, as well as the
                  federal monopoly in immigration matters, the attorney general is under no
                  obligation to heed this invalid order," Abraham said.

                  Bernard Perlmutter, director of the University of Miami's Children and
                  Youth Law Clinic, said Florida law says child custody rests with the natural
                  parent unless there is clear proof the parent is unfit.

                  Bill would grant child U.S. citizenship

                  "We are hoping the INS may back down," said Laura Fabar, one of the
                  attorneys for the boy's Miami relatives. She said the boy's father
                  would be notified of the March 6 hearing.

                  Another attorney for the family, Roger Bernstein, told CNN on Tuesday he
                  is filing a new petition with the INS seeking political asylum for Elian on
                  grounds he would face persecution -- physical or psychological harm -- if
                  returned to Cuba.

                  He said he filed an earlier such request December 13 and followed up two
                  days later after the INS questioned whether Gonzalez had the legal authority
                  to seek political asylum for Elian.

                  Bernstein said he was waiting to see how Reno would respond to the
                  lawyers' request that she overrule the January 5 decision by the INS to
                  return Elian to Cuba before taking his petition for political asylum to federal
                  court.

                  In the meantime, he said, if the INS ignores the state court ruling granting
                  temporary custody of the boy to his great uncle, "We will challenge them in
                  federal court."

                  One lawmaker is trying to make an end-run around the INS through an act
                  of Congress.

                  "I'll be presenting the bill, it's called a special bill, to grant U.S. citizenship for
                  Elian. I'll be doing it with other members of Congress, many of whom are
                  eager to have this legal protection for Elian," said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen,
                  R-Florida.

                  Meanwhile, Rep. Patrick Kennedy, R-Rhode Island, is one of several
                  House Democrats joining Rep. Dan Burton, R-Indiana, the House Reform
                  Committee chairman, in sending a letter to Reno on Elian's case. Most of
                  those signing the letter are Republicans.

                  The letter calls on Reno to "... make a public commitment that the Justice
                  Department will take no action to return Elian to Cuba, until he has had the
                  opportunity to exercise all of the legal options available to him."

                  Burton on Friday issued a subpoena for Elian to appear before his
                  committee as a delaying tactic to prevent the boy's return to Cuba.

                  Speculation on father's wishes

                  Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch, a Republican candidate for
                  president, urged Reno to delay the boy's return until "we ensure that the
                  boy's father's true wishes are followed, even if that requires bringing
                  his entire family here temporarily."

                  In her ruling Monday, Rodriguez called on Elian's father to appear personally
                  at the March 6 custody hearing, saying "his failure to appear may result in a
                  decision adverse to his interest."

                  She also said she was convinced the boy would face imminent harm if he
                  was returned to Cuba now.

                  The family argued in its petition to the state court that Juan Miguel Gonzalez
                  cannot speak freely because of the "coercive nature" of the Cuban
                  government.

                  Bernstein said, "Elian's father cannot say, for example, 'Well I am glad my
                  son is in America. That's what my ex-wife wanted. That's what I want.' He
                  cannot say that without dire consequences."

                  Bernstein said when the elder Gonzalez was told his son was in Miami, he
                  said to the family "'Take care of my son.' After that his tone has changed."

                  'No more orphans to the embargo'

                  In New York on Tuesday, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark
                  accused anti-Castro activists in Miami of kidnapping as he led about 50
                  people, including community leaders, church activists and Cuban-
                  Americans, in a protest calling for the return of Elian to Cuba.

                  Eleven members of the group were arrested when they blocked the entrance
                  to the New York offices of the INS after Clark had left the protest.

                  Among those arrested was the Rev. Lucius Walker, director of Pastors for
                  Peace, who has been a vocal opponent of the U.S. trade embargo against
                  Cuba.

                  Clark said the embargo was the reason the boy's mother was driven to flee
                  the country and ultimately the reason she died.

                  "What incredible insanity is driving us to hold this child, to glorify the
                  grossness of our materialism as if you can buy the soul of a child," Clark
                  said.

                  "There will be no more orphans to the embargo," he said. "We will end the
                  embargo, and we'll let Elian choose what he wants to do with his life when
                  he becomes an adult, and we know if we leave him alone, it will be great,"
                  he said.

                  Clark was attorney general under President Lyndon Johnson from 1967 to
                  1969.

                  The protesters vowed to demonstrate every week until Elian is returned to
                  his father in Cuba.