WASHINGTON - A wide smile covered Rep. Barbara Cubin's face as she posed for a photograph with a bunch of beefy United Mine Workers of America coal miners, their president Cecil Roberts, and their congressional ally West Virginia Democratic Rep. Nick J. Rahall.

Cubin and the Mine Workers have joined forces on legislation that would reauthorize and overhaul the federal program for cleaning up coal mines that were operated by companies that have gone out of business.

They posed for the photograph following a March 30 congressional hearing.

The Republican lawmaker insists there is nothing incongruous about the photograph or her alliance with the miners' union.

"I don't find it unusual at all," Cubin said.

Nevertheless, she was stumped when asked to cite another instance when she and the United Mine Workers of America had been on the same side of an issue.

"You know at this moment I cannot," Cubin conceded. "I guess there isn't one, but because we haven't worked together doesn't mean we shouldn't. I have never had anything against the Mine Workers."

Roberts also could not cite any examples of a time when he and Cubin had joined forces.

"You know, I really haven't had the opportunity to work with her," Roberts said.

The miners, who sat in the back row of the hearing room in canary yellow polo shirts with the union's logo emblazoned across the left breast, also could not remember working with Cubin.

"Nah; uh, uh," replied Raleigh County, West Virginia, miner Jimmy Austin when asked if he could remember an issue when he had sided with Cubin.

The cleaning up of abandoned mines is not at the top of the agenda for either Cubin or the Mine Workers.

Cubin's number one priority is a proposal to have the federal government pay Wyoming more than $400 million it is owed in payments from the abandoned mine reclamation fund.

The Mine Workers' top priority is a provision that would maintain the solvency of a federal program that provides health care to miners whose companies have gone out of business.

"We're in this together," Rahall said. "We both recognize our issues are parochial, but we're in this together."

Besides requiring the federal government to pay Wyoming the more than $400 million it is owed and shoring up the miners' healthcare fund, Cubin and Rahall's bill would also reduce the tax that current coal companies pay into the fund.

It also would guarantee that Wyoming receives future payments from the fund.

Cubin, Wyoming's senators, and the Mine Workers oppose a proposal offered by the Bush administration and Pennsylvania lawmakers that would cut off future payments for Wyoming. The Mine Workers say it would leave the healthcare fund bound for bankruptcy.

The Mine Workers oppose a proposal offered by Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo., because they say that, like the administration's plan, it does not shore up the healthcare fund.

Wyoming AFL-CIO Executive Secretary Kim Floyd was shocked to hear that Cubin was working with organized labor. He said he couldn't remember a time when the AFL-CIO and Cubin had worked together.

"Oh man, absolutely not," Floyd said.

Floyd was the Wyoming AFL-CIO's political director from 1986 until he was laid off in 1998 and signed on as executive secretary in September 2003. He could not remember a single instance that he had been on the same side of the issue as Cubin.

"Rep. Cubin has never voted with us," the Cody native said. "The working men and women are not on her radar screen. She has consistently sided with big energy and other large corporations. At least (Sen. Mike) Enzi, (R-Wyo.), and Thomas occasionally give us a nod."

Floyd estimated that there are between 650 and 800 Mine Worker members in Wyoming. That total includes about 230 miners at Pittsburg & Midway Coal Mining Company's Kemmerer Mine.

It also includes some of the miners who work at the Decker Coal Company's Decker, Mont., mine, but live in Wyoming. City workers in Kemmerer, Rock Springs and Sheridan are also members of the United Mine Workers of America.

There are approximately 18,000 AFL-CIO members living in Wyoming, according to Floyd.

University of Wyoming history professor Phil Roberts said that despite the current dearth of unionized miners in the state, the United Mine Workers once had a strong hold on Wyoming.

"In the 1950s the union disappeared along with the underground coal mines," Roberts said. "By the time the surface mines came along in the 1970s, they were not very strong."

Floyd's antipathy toward Cubin has clearly not influenced Mine Workers President Roberts' attitude toward her. He believes she has had a changing of the heart.

"Four years ago I would have probably said that I was surprised that someone who doesn't have these retirees would care about these issues and be so sympathetic," Roberts said. "I am really glad I have had the opportunity to work with her."