Race between Romney, Obama still all about Ohio

Pres­i­dent Barack Obama ges­tures to sup­port­ers at Rick­en­backer Inter­na­tional Air­port in Colum­bus as he arrives for a cam­paign stop at The Ohio State Uni­ver­sity Tues­day. (Asso­ci­ated Press | Paul Vernon)

BEN FELLER

KASIE HUNT

Asso­ci­ated Press

COLUMBUS — It’s still all about Ohio.

After a strong debate per­for­mance, Repub­li­can chal­lenger Mitt Rom­ney is inten­si­fy­ing his efforts in the state that’s crit­i­cal to his White House hopes, while Pres­i­dent Barack Obama works to hang on to the polling edge he’s had here for weeks.

Both can­di­dates cam­paigned hard in the state Tues­day, the last day of voter reg­is­tra­tion ahead of Elec­tion Day, now just four weeks away.

“Find at least one per­son who voted for Barack Obama last time and con­vince them to come join our team,” Rom­ney told vot­ers in Van Meter, Iowa, before hur­ry­ing east­ward to make a sim­i­lar pitch in Ohio, where he was cam­paign­ing with New Jer­sey Gov. Chris Christie.

Obama, in Colum­bus, called out, “All right, Buck­eyes, we need you.” His cam­paign had buses nearby, ready to ferry stu­dents or other sup­port­ers to reg­is­tra­tion centers.

As Obama wooed Ohio State Uni­ver­sity stu­dents here and Rom­ney focused on the Demo­c­ra­tic bas­tion of Cuya­hoga County to the north, there were signs the president’s Ohio advan­tage was nar­row­ing. A new CNN poll showed Obama lead­ing Rom­ney 51 per­cent to 47 per­cent among likely Ohio vot­ers. And Repub­li­can strate­gists famil­iar with Romney’s inter­nal polling con­tended the race was even closer — within a sin­gle per­cent­age point — as the can­di­date enjoyed a post-debate surge of support.

“I promise you he’s back in the game in Ohio,” said Char­lie Black, an infor­mal Rom­ney cam­paign adviser.

Like other Repub­li­cans, he cred­its Romney’s strong debate appear­ance last week as the rea­son for an uptick in national polling. And Rom­ney advis­ers main­tain they’re see­ing evi­dence of that in the bat­tle­ground states most likely to decide the elec­tion, Ohio among them.

“There isn’t any ques­tion that he has breathed new life and new energy into the Repub­li­can Party,” Ohio Gov. John Kaisch said Tues­day on a con­fer­ence call with reporters. “We’re see­ing that there is greater inten­sity among Repub­li­cans and a great will­ing­ness to get out and vote and par­tic­i­pate than we’re see­ing with Democrats.”

With a hefty 18 elec­toral votes, Ohio is such a key state for Rom­ney that one top adviser has dubbed it “the ball game” as the Repub­li­can looks to string together enough state vic­to­ries to amass the 270 Elec­toral Col­lege votes needed to take the White House. No Repub­li­can has won the pres­i­dency with­out this Mid­west­ern state, and if Rom­ney were to lose here, he would have to carry every other bat­tle­ground state except tiny New Hampshire.

Rom­ney has far fewer state-by-state paths to the White House than Obama, who still has sev­eral routes to vic­tory should he lose here.

Given the stakes and with just 28 days left in the cam­paign, Romney’s sched­ule high­lights his increased focus on the state: He’s spend­ing four of the next five days in Ohio, ahead of the sec­ond pres­i­den­tial debate in New York next Tues­day. Run­ning mate Paul Ryan squares off against Vice Pres­i­dent Joe Biden on Thurs­day for the sole debate fea­tur­ing the No. 2’s on the tickets.

Obama was being greeted in Colum­bus — for a rally at Ohio State Uni­ver­sity — by enor­mous let­ters that spelled out “vote early,” a plea to the young vot­ers who buoyed the president’s bid in 2008. He arrived from the West Coast, where he had been rais­ing mil­lions of dol­lars for the campaign.

Obama cam­paign spokes­woman Jen Psaki dis­missed the impact of polls show­ing a tighter race, say­ing Democ­rats always expected the race here and else­where to tighten ahead of Elec­tion Day.

“We have blind­ers on,” she told reporters trav­el­ing on Air Force One. “We’re imple­ment­ing our own game plan.”

Illus­trat­ing the com­pet­i­tive nature of Ohio, no pres­i­den­tial bat­tle­ground has been more sat­u­rated with tele­vi­sion advertising.

The cam­paigns and out­side groups had spent more than $141 mil­lion on TV ads in Ohio through the begin­ning of Octo­ber, one of the high­est per-person spend­ing rates in the coun­try. Only more-populous Florida, which has seen $150 mil­lion in ad spend­ing, has seen a higher total.

Ads in Ohio have focused on the energy indus­try — some rural, south­ern areas of the state rely heav­ily on coal — and on China, where for­eign com­pa­nies are seen as com­pet­ing with Ohio’s man­u­fac­tur­ing base and jeop­ar­diz­ing jobs.

Obama has sought to paint Rom­ney as a plu­to­crat who out­sourced jobs dur­ing his tenure lead­ing the pri­vate equity firm Bain Capital.

Rom­ney, in turn, has sharply crit­i­cized Obama’s sup­port for stricter reg­u­la­tions on coal and nat­ural gas. It’s seen as a way in with white working-class vot­ers, on which his can­di­dacy depends. “Stop the War on Coal. Fire Obama,” read signs that dot the coun­try­side of areas where Rom­ney has held mul­ti­ple events.

White blue-collar work­ers pre­fer Rom­ney to Obama, but less so than they did Repub­li­can George W. Bush, who car­ried Ohio in 2004. These vot­ers are con­sid­ered still per­suad­able, although Rom­ney may have hurt him­self with his com­ment that the 47 per­cent of Amer­i­cans who pay no income tax believe they are vic­tims enti­tled to gov­ern­ment help.

Romney’s posi­tion on the auto bailout also dogs him in a state that’s heav­ily reliant on the indus­try. Obama’s deci­sion to offer gov­ern­ment sup­port to automak­ers meant pro­tec­tion for thou­sands of jobs at parts and sup­ply com­pa­nies in Ohio.

Rom­ney wrote a 2008 op-ed head­lined “Let Detroit Go Bank­rupt,” which has become a ral­ly­ing cry for Democ­rats. They have argued Obama’s sup­port for the bailout has had a hand in Ohio’s drop in unem­ploy­ment, which is now lower than the national average.

In the final weeks, both cam­paigns insist they have the edge in the crit­i­cal ground game. That bat­tle was play­ing out in the courts, as well, with Ohio’s elec­tion chief say­ing Tues­day he will appeal a rul­ing that rein­states the final three early vot­ing days in the state.

Ohio Sec­re­tary of State Jon Husted called a deci­sion last week by a fed­eral appeals court “an unprece­dented intru­sion” into how states run elections.

Husted said Friday’s deci­sion by the 6th U.S. Cir­cuit Court of Appeals would affect how elec­tions are run in all 50 states. The appeals court in Cincin­nati affirmed a lower court rul­ing and returned dis­cre­tion to set hours on the final three days to local boards of elections.

Posted by AP News on Oct 9 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.