Obama and Romney court Ohio voters in race's final days – as it happened

Campaigns battle for undecided voters in key swing states
Obama camp boasts 125m voter contacts
Big crowds turn out to hear Romney
President has edge in early voting
 Read our latest summary
US Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney holds a supporter's baby during a campaign rally at Avon Lake High School in Avon Lake, on Ohio.
Mitt Romney holds a supporter's baby during a campaign rally at Avon Lake high school in Ohio. Photograph: Emmanuel Dunard/AFP/Getty Images

Summary

We're going to wrap up today's live blog politics coverage. Here's a summary of where things stand:

Early voting has begun. The president is ahead, the AP reports, but he hasn't built the kind of lead he enjoyed at this stage in 2008.

The Obama camp released a memo claiming volunteers had made 125m+ voter contacts and registered 1.8m new voters in swing states. If those numbers are accurate, they'll help on Tuesday.

As reports emerged of persistent Hurricane Sandy-related power and infrastructure damage that could hinder voting Tuesday, election officials insisted that everything will work as planned.

President Obama and former President Clinton will appear at a joint rally tonight in Virginia. Governor Romney ends his day with a big event outside Denver.

AND REMEMBER: If you live in the United States, Daylight Savings Time ends overnight, meaning you should set your clocks back one hour. But our clocks all do that by themselves now don't they?

Governor Mitt Romney is on stage at his event in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

"You were chanting 'three more days,'" Romney says. "We're going to have to change that chant tomorrow. We'll come up with something, I'm sure."

There's a little feedback in Romney's mic, sounds tinny.

From Colorado Springs the GOP nominee heads to Englewood, Colorado, outside Denver for a blowout Saturday finale.

McKay Coppins (@mckaycoppins)

Huge crowd for Romney at an airport hangar rally in Colorado Springs. twitter.com/mckaycoppins/s…

November 3, 2012

Obama camp claims 125m+ voter contacts

The Obama campaign has released a memo boasting some very large numbers of voters registered and phone contacts made. The numbers, which are not independently verifiable, far exceed the Romney camp estimates.

"Our volunteers have made 125,646,479 personal phone calls or door knocks that resulted in conversations with voters – not counting robo calls on auto-dialers, mail, literature drops or any other non-volunteer, non-personal contacts," the memo says.

The figure is roughly equivalent to the total number of voters in 2008.

The Romney camp boasts 50m such contacts – and that figure includes robocalling and unanswered calls or door knocks, Politico's Jennifer Epstein has reported.

The Obama memo claims a big number of newly registered voters in swing states, too: "This cycle, our teams registered 1,792,261 voters in key battleground states – nearly double the number of voters the Obama campaign registered in 2008".

This number for early voters in Ohio is a good 23% higher than the AP estimate we linked to earlier.

Tapper is the lauded ABC News White House correspondent.

Jake Tapper (@jaketapper)

Ohio Secretary of State says 1.6 million Ohioans have already voted.

November 3, 2012

The LA Times's Maeve Reston has spent months on the bus – the flying bus – with the Romney campaign. Lately she senses a new feeling creeping in:

When Romney retreats to his campaign plane after each event with his aides and his wife Ann there is now a hint of something else: relief. [...]

For many months, Romney has spent his flights working studiously on his iPad, scrolling through policy briefings, revising his speeches and jotting his thoughts in a campaign journal. But those tasks are mostly complete.

Read the whole story here.

Mitt's Body Man (@dgjackson)

Sam Ryan and Gov waving to the crowd as we arrive at West Chester, Ohio. twitter.com/dgjackson/stat…

November 3, 2012

Will Farrell will do anything to get you to vote.

Haaretz endorses: "Obama is good for Israel."

(h/t: @nytjim)

That Wisconsin crowd for the president was pretty good. Lis Smith is literally in the Obama camp:

Lis Smith (@Lis_Smith)

20,000 turn out for @barackobama in Milwaukee. Or as @mittromney would say, 40,000. twitter.com/jrpsaki/status… #forward

November 3, 2012

Obama leading in early voting – AP

President Obama holds a lead over Governor Romney among early voters, but the lead is not as big as his was over John McCain in 2008, according to the Associated Press.

Obama beat McCain 365-173. Here's AP. Click through for a state-by-state breakdown:

About 25 million people already have voted in 34 states and the District of Columbia. No votes will be counted until Election Day but several battleground states are releasing the party affiliation of people who have voted early.

So far, Democratic voters outnumber Republicans in Florida, Iowa, Nevada, North Carolina and Ohio - five states that could decide the election, if they voted the same way. Republicans have the edge in Colorado, which Obama won in 2008.

Obama dominated early voting in 2008, building up such big leads in Colorado, Florida, Iowa and North Carolina that he won each state despite losing the Election Day vote, according to voting data compiled by The Associated Press.

The president is on the stump in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, (=10 electoral votes). He sounds a bit hoarse. Lot of miles on that voice the last few days.

President Obama in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2012.
President Obama in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2012. Photograph: CBS

Another peppy crowd. "Wisconsin, you see my bet is on you."

The NY Times's Trip Gabriel has a fun update from the trail:

Safe to say, no one is having more fun on the campaign trail than the three young children of Paul and Janna Ryan. At each Tarmac touchdown, when the candidate and his wife dash into a waiting vehicle, Sam, 7, Charlie, 9, and Liza, 10, enthusiastically wave to camera crews huddled under the airplane wing for another perfunctory “arrival” photo that no one will probably ever use.

Read it all here.

Paul Ryan (@PaulRyanVP)

Campaign spokesman in training, my youngest son Sam. twitter.com/PaulRyanVP/sta…

October 12, 2012

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal stumps for Romney in New Hampshire:

Gov. Bobby Jindal (@BobbyJindal)

New Hampshire is fired up for Tuesday! #Romney'sReady twitter.com/BobbyJindal/st…

November 3, 2012

What if the storm had hit a week later?

Emergency food, water and warm clothing are being distributed in New York City, where elderly residents of public housing have electricity again after four days in the dark and cold. On Long Beach, homeowners stand sentry outside their flooded residences to stop looters. On Staten Island injured residents plead for aid. Gas is rationed in New Jersey, where stretches of coastal settlements simply no longer exist. Parts of West Virginia sit buried in snow. Trees block highways in Connecticut.

The fallout from Hurricane Sandy is still being felt across the region, in some places acutely. For the presidential candidates, one challenge is to strike the right tone on the trail, which is why every speech by a candidate or surrogate today has begun with a call for aid to the storm victims.

Election officials have another concern: Will damage from Sandy actually pose an obstacle to voting? "Sandy confuses voters flooded out of usual polling places," reads a Star-Ledger (N.J.) headline today. "Nine Cleveland-area voting locations without power in Sandy's wake," the Cleveland Plain-Dealer (Ohio) reported last night.

Officials say voting will go on as planned. "There’s no reason why anybody shouldn’t vote," New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said. "We’re going to have a full, fair and transparent voting process."

Breaking Politics(@breakingpol)

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie says paper ballots will be available on Tuesday at polling stations without power - @reuters

November 3, 2012

The New York Times' Michael Cooper, who reported that some polling sites in Pennsylvania were out of power Friday morning, surveyed possible complications yesterday:

Disrupted postal delivery will probably slow the return of absentee ballots. And with some polling sites likely to be moved, elections officials were bracing for a big influx of provisional paper ballots — which could delay the vote count in places.

Weary local elections officials vowed that the vote would go on. “Come hell or high water — we had both — we’re voting on Tuesday,” William T. Biamonte, the Democratic commissioner at the Nassau County Board of Elections, said in an interview.

Mike Hayes (@michaelhayes)

The New Yorker cover this week. Spot on. twitter.com/michaelhayes/s…

November 3, 2012

What if the storm had hit a week later?

Whatever you think of Todd "legitimate rape" Akin's views on women's health issues, no one can accuse him of hypocrisy on abortion. He was arrested at least eight times in the 1980s during abortion protests, the National Journal reports.

Akin was arrested on October 26, 1985, April 19, 1986 and February 28, 1987 for trespassing. A December, 27 1986 arrest was for "trespassing and peace disturbance." The arrests reported by the Post-Dispatch came in the same period, between March 1985 and May 1987, but occurred at other clinics. Three were in St. Louis and one in Granite City, Illinois. The paper said protesters tried to block access to the clinics and refused to leave. In one case, Akin was carried out by police. The last known arrest came shortly before Akin's 1988 election to the Missouri State House, where he served for 12 years before he joined the House.

Akin campaign spokesperson Rick Tyler declined to comment on the new arrest records.

Slate's Dave Weigel checks out early voting in Ohio.

daveweigel (@daveweigel)

Early voting in Cincinnati. The cut-off for the line was 2 pm; plenty wait in the rain. twitter.com/daveweigel/sta…

November 3, 2012

The Guardian's Gary Younge explores the paradox of black Americans' enduring optimism and support for President Obama on one hand, and the diminished prospects of African-Americans on the other: "The ascent of America's first black president has coincided with the one of the steepest descents of the economic fortunes of black Americans since the second world war both in real terms and relative to whites":

African Americans, as a group, are far worse off now than they were when Obama came to power and the gap between whites and blacks in terms of wealth and income has increased under Obama's tenure. The overall rate of unemployment may be close to where it was when Obama took office, but black unemployment is up 11%. Meanwhile the wealth gap has doubled during this recession with the average white American now having 22 times more wealth than their black counterparts. [...]

Herein lies the dual paradox. The group that has fared worse under Obama is not only the group most likely to support him but also the most likely to feel optimistic about the deteriorating situation in which they find themselves. And why has that loyalty to the president yet to be fully tested? What do they know that the numbers don't show?

Discussing this dilemma within the black community can be tantamount to heresy. [...]

Read the whole piece here.

The Guardian's Ed Pilkington has another view on the big Romney rally in West Chester, Ohio last night:

If this mega rally, which the organisers inexplicably billed as a "Romney-Ryan Real Recovery Road Rally", was designed to show the world that the Republican nominee finally has the back of his own party, it was left terribly late in the day. With less than three days left of campaigning, we are well beyond the eleventh hour.

But the crowd lapped it up, chanting "Four more days" as a taunting riposte to the Democrats' "four more years", and waving placards that said: "Moms for Mitt", "We are Romulans" and "Redlegs for Romney".

US Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney supporters attend a rally at Union Center in West Chester, Ohio, November 2, 2012.  AFP PHOTO/Emmanuel DUNANDEMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images HORIZONTAL
US Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney supporters attend a rally at Union Center in West Chester, Ohio, November 2, 2012.

LIbertarian Party presidential nominee Gary Johnson calls for breaking the party "duopoly" on power:

 The Republicans and Democrats have spent decades trading power back and forth between themselves, and in doing so, have managed to install a two-party duopoly that completely controls America's political process. This duopoly runs everything from how candidates qualify to get on the ballot, to who is invited to the only debates aired on national television, to, yes, the special-interest money that fuels their billion-dollar campaigns.

The consequences of this insider game? Too many voters approach Tuesday's election believing their choice is between a Republican and a Democrat, with no other real option. And why shouldn't they? The debates they have seen only included the Republican and the Democrat. The hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of TV ads they have seen are all about the Republican and the Democrat. And the news media? Well, they have bought into the whole scheme, with coverage that overwhelmingly portrays a two-party race.

Read the whole piece here.

Be apprised that this blog entry contains the F-word.

A new get-out-the-vote web site is pitched to voters who want to vote but who have trouble keeping track of just where exactly to do that.

The site is yourfuckingpollingplace.com. Visitors to the site can enter an address and find out where to vote – but they will have to endure some bad language.

Michelle Obama campaigns at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN.
Michelle Obama campaigns at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN. Photograph: CNN

"We treat everyone, do you hear me, everyone, with dignity and respect, from the teachers who admire us to the janitors who keep our schools clean!"

First lady Michelle Obama is campaigning in Ohio. She says the president cares about the poor, understands women, believes in equal opportunity and access to good schools.

This crowd of students is very much enjoying this speaker. Biggest line:

"Everybody knows full well that cutting Sesame Street is no way to balance our budget."

Veeps on the loose

Vice President Joe Biden at Arvada West High School in Arvada, Colorado, in a screen grab from CNN.
Vice President Joe Biden at Arvada West High School in Arvada, Colorado, in a screen grab from CNN. Photograph: CNN

"I am more optimistic about America's chances now than I was when I got elected when I was 29 years old" – Vice President Joe Biden campaigning in Arvada, Colorado.

Rep. Paul Ryan campaigning in Middletown, Pennsylvania, in a screen grab from CNN.
Rep. Paul Ryan campaigning in Middletown, Pennsylvania, in a screen grab from CNN. Photograph: CNN

"I say in 3 days, we win, Obama loses!" – Rep. Paul Ryan campaigning outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

(h/t @AlexNBCNews)

Romney is winding toward the end of his stump speech in Dubuque, Iowa.

Obama has broken his campaign promises: he promised to be post-partisan; he promised 5.2% unemployment; he promised to lower health care premiums; he promised to secure Medicare; he promised to work across the aisle – but he hasn't delivered, Romney says.

"He made a lot of promises, but they were promises he couldn't keep. I've made promises that I've kept and will keep for the American people."

Mitt Romney campaigning in Dubuque, Iowa, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN.
Mitt Romney campaigning in Dubuque, Iowa, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN. Photograph: CNN

Romney still looks great, and sounds strong on the stump. It's as if 18 months of nonstop campaigning has energized him.

Romney accuses Obama of not working with Congress: "he's ignored them, he's attacked them. ... Can you imagine four more years of that going on?"

The crowd lustily boos.

The strategy is to tap frustration with gridlock in Washington. The question is who catches the blame.

Romney returns to the "Voting is the best revenge line." It's his biggest line so far:

"He's asking his supporters to vote for revenge. I'm asking you to vote for love of country."

Now the biggest chant of the rally: "U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!"

"The door is open," Romney says. "We're going to walk through it."

Governor Romney is up on the stage at the airport in Dubuque, Iowa. He introduces his wife Ann, who speaks briefly and then introduces him back.

"Three more days!" the crowd begins to chant. "Three more days!"

Ann and Mitt Romney in Dubuque, Iowa, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from 2012.
Ann and Mitt Romney in Dubuque, Iowa, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from 2012. Photograph: CNN

Summary

The candidates move to close the deal: Both Romney and Obama have given one stump speech today and Romney's about to give another. Obama plans to hit four states; Romney will hit three. Paul Ryan is hitting four. Joe Biden is staying in Colorado.

President Obama and former President Clinton will appear at a joint rally tonight in Virginia. Governor Romney ends his day with a big event outside Denver. Dozens of high-profile surrogates have joined the Republican candidate on the trail.

Early voting continues across the country – but it's the last day of early voting in Florida, where polls are closed Sunday and Monday.

ProgressOhio (@ProgressOhio)

Ohio Early Voting Hours:Saturday 8am-2pmSunday 1pm-5pmMonday 8am-2pmTo find your location go to:... fb.me/1fYVs2fH7

November 3, 2012

Mitt Romney's first choice for a vice presidential running mate was New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Politico reported this morning.

The state polls show Obama as the clear favorite in the race, and handicappers who credit the polls are beginning to object vociferously to the notion that the race is "tied." It's not tied, they say.

Matthew Dowd (@matthewjdowd)

When is the last time this late in modern pres campaigns that the preponderance of numerous public polls were wrong? Answer: never.

November 2, 2012

Republican adviser Ana Navarro is keeping an eye on early voting in Miami.

Ana Navarro (@ananavarro)

Elderly, pregnant women, young ppl, R's, D's - all making long lines to cast their ballot. Examples of civic duty twitter.com/ananavarro/sta…

November 3, 2012

A long engagement nears its end

The campaign workers on both sides who have spent a decade, some of them, working for their candidate now are joining the candidates on the trail. The Associated Press reports on the last, bittersweet stage of a lengthy engagement:

In a whiff of 2008 nostalgia, some of Obama's traveling companions from his campaign four years ago were planning to join him on the road for the final days of his last campaign. Among them are Robert Gibbs, who served as Obama's first White House press secretary, and Reggie Love, Obama's former personal aide who left the White House earlier this year.

Likewise, virtually Romney's entire senior team has left the campaign's Boston headquarters to travel with Romney for the contest's final three days. Their presence for the campaign's waning hours is an admission that the strategy and planning is largely complete. His schedule has been set, the ads have been placed and Romney's message has been decided.

Worth reading in full here.

The Romney campaign is out with a new ad hitting the president for saying "voting is the best revenge." The ad picks up on a back-and-forth that developed on the trail yesterday.

"Did you see what President Obama said today?" Romney said at a rally last night in West Chester, Ohio. "He asked his supporters to vote for revenge – for revenge. Instead I ask the American people to vote for love of country."

At a Springfield, Ohio, rally yesterday the president told a crowd booing Romney's name, "Don't boo, vote. Vote! Voting is the best revenge."

It's not shocking that the Romney ad chooses not to pick up on the literary echo in the president's words. The 17th-century English poet and proverbialist – he spent time compiling a book of proverbs - George Herbert is credited with the wise tidbit, "Living well is the best revenge."

Herbert also said, "One enemy is too much," and, "A fool may throw a stone into a well, which a hundred wise men cannot pull out."

President Obama is just wrapping up a speech at Mentor High School in Mentor, Ohio.

He has hit a lot of the same notes that drew big applause in a barn speech in Hilliard, Ohio, last night.

"Governor Romney, he is a very talented salesman," Obama said. "So in this campaign he has tried to re-package the same policies that didn't work, and offer it up as change."

President Obama campaigns in Mentor, Ohio, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN.
President Obama campaigns in Mentor, Ohio, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN. Photograph: CNN

The president's hardest hits came on the topic of the auto industry, and the Romney ad implying jobs tied to Chrysler/Jeep are ending up in China.

"Governor Romney's running ads saying that Jeep is shipping jobs to China," Obama said. "There's only one problem. It's not true. Everybody knows it's not true. The car companies themselves told the Romney campaign to knock it off...

"I understand that Governor Romney's had a tough time here in Ohio because he was against saving the auto industry… But that's not a justification for running these kinds of ads because this isn't a game. These are people's lives…

"You don't scare hard-working Americans just to scare up some votes. That's not what being the president is about."

Peppy crowd.

Daralene Jones, a reporter at WFTV in Orlando, Florida, has been tweeting pictures of long lines in Orlando on the last day of early voting in the state:

Daralene Jones (@DaraleneJones)

I am floored that the Governor did not extend early voting. This line is unreal! twitter.com/DaraleneJones/…

November 3, 2012

The Guardian's Chris McGreal reports on the fight to keep polling stations open through the weekend in Florida – and an ugly-seeming series of moves on the part of the Republican legislature:

Florida voters have faced long lines all week to vote early in part because the ballot runs to several pages, with proposed constitutional amendments as well as electing a president, members of Congress and local officials, and it takes a while to fill it out even if people are fully prepared. But there's another reason.

The Republican-controlled Florida legislature cut the number of early voting days sharply (by how many depends on area) in an apparent attempt to discourage turnout by supporters of Obama and the Democrats who are more likely to turn out early. One particularly blatant move was to scrap voting on the last Sunday before election day when many African Americans in Florida traditionally go to the polls after church.

But there have been other measures to discourage early voting, or voting at all, some of which have been struck down by the federal courts as blatant discrimination. The League of Women Voters says that the man behind this is the same Republican party official who effectively rigged the 2000 vote in Florida which delivered George Bush into power by a few hundred voters. The league alleges in a lawsuit that the Republican party of Florida's legal counsel, Emmett "Bucky'' Mitchell IV, wrote the first draft of legislation making it considerably more difficult for groups such as the League of Women Voters to conduct voter registration campaigns and requiring photo identification for voters on the grounds of concern about fraudulent balloting - a virtually non-existent problem. Both measures were eventually blocked by federal courts. 

Mitchell was also the man behind the removal of convicted felons from the Florida voters' role in 2000 which led to many innocent people with similar names being deprived of the right to vote. A disproportionate number of them were African Americans, who tend to vote for Democrats. The League of Women Voters said that Mitchell's involvement in the most recent legislation is evidence of a "partisan agenda to manipulate the voting rules".

Former President Bill Clinton has just taken the stage at the Obama rally in Chesapeake, Virginia.

Clinton will appear with Obama tonight at a major rally in Bristow, Virginia.

The crowd likes them some Clinton. They're applauding and squealing (yes, this is audible). As he begins speaking, he's repeatedly interrupted by people yelling "We love you Bill!"

Former President Bill Clinton stumps for President Obama in Chesapeake, Virginia, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN.
Former President Bill Clinton stumps for President Obama in Chesapeake, Virginia, Saturday, Nov. 3, 2012, in a screen grab from CNN. Photograph: CNN

"I am much more enthusiastic about [Obama] today than I was four years ago," Clinton says. "And I want you to know why."

Clinton says Obama has been a great commander-in-chief, ending the war in Iraq and bringing troops back from Afghanistan. The president has been "aggressive" in his use of military power, Clinton says.

Then an applause line: "He's got a great secretary of state!"

Clinton summarizes up Colin Powell's endorsement of Obama: "His opponent's advisers are the same neocons that got us into the Iraq war based on bad evidence."

Clinton attacks Bush FEMA chief Michael Brown, who criticized President Obama in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy for prematurely declaring a disaster.

"[Brown] criticized the president for being too quick to respond to this tragedy," Clinton says. "I say bring it on, more criticism like that."

Dueling polls in Florida

Where's Florida? The NBC/WSJ/Marist poll from yesterday midnight puts Obama ahead 49-47. But a new Tampa Bay Times / Miami Herald poll puts Mitt Romney ahead in the state by 6 points.

The Guardian's Chris McGreal reports that the Tampa Bay poll backs up anecdotal evidence from voting lines. It's the last day of early voting in Florida, he notes:

The poll gives Romney 51% to 45% for Obama, a slight drop on the Republican candidate's surge following the president's lacklustre performance in the first debate. Other polls have the race tighter but with Romney generally holding a two percentage point lead. 

The Tampa Bay Times / Miami Herald poll confirms anecdotal evidence from voting lines - that a good number of undecideds have been persuaded that Romney will do a better job of fixing the economy even if they are not happy with the Republicans on other issues, such as unemployment. Many voters say that the principal issue for them is jobs in a state hit particularly hard by unemployment and the property crash.

Both parties are claiming that early voting trends in Florida give them the upper hand. The Republicans say that Democratic turnout is down on four years ago. Democrats say that they are still ahead in absolute terms. About 3.5 million Floridians have voted early so far - either by post or in person. That's about 30% of the state's electorate and a dramatic increase on 2008 when 2.7 million voted early.

About 1.39 million of those are registered Republicans and 1.47 are Democrats. However, that doesn't mean to say that's how they voted.

Polarizing pollster Nate Silver has gone from "I bet you this race isn't a tossup" to "for this race to be a tossup, the state polls would have to be contaminated by systemic bias."

Silver points to 22 swing state polls published Friday that found 1 Romney win, two ties... and 19 wins for the president:

A tossup race isn’t likely to produce 19 leads for one candidate and one for the other — any more than a fair coin is likely to come up heads 19 times and tails just once in 20 tosses. (The probability of a fair coin doing so is about 1 chance in 50,000.)

Instead, Mr. Romney will have to hope that the coin isn’t fair, and instead has been weighted to Mr. Obama’s advantage. In other words, he’ll have to hope that the polls have been biased in Mr. Obama’s favor.

At the Romney rally last night former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani overcame his native pacifism to deliver a prickly partisan attack on the president, culminating with a call for Obama's resignation (at 1:57).

You may notice the color coordination, which was not an accident: Romney surrogates at the rally all wore either red, white or blue.

Satire alert:

Joshua Hersh (@joshuahersh)

Could affect race. Waiting for 538 analysis MT @samsteinhp Obama aide confirms he will resign today, citing Giuliani's demand that he do so

November 3, 2012

Governor Mitt Romney isn't wasting any of the campaign's remaining 72 hours, embarking on a whistle-stop tour of key swing states. He's already hosted a rally at the airport in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and is on his way to one in Dubuque, Iowa. Then it's on to Colorado, for a rally in Colorado Springs and then a big evening event south of Denver.

Rep. Paul Ryan, Romney's vice presidential pick, is scheduled to appear in no fewer than four (4!) states today. If you had to guess, which ones would you say those were? Ohio, Virginia, Florida... and Pennsylvania? The Romney camp continues to keep the Keystone State in its sights, despite polling averages showing the president up there by about 6 points.

President Barack Obama plans to hit four states himself today. He's to start within the hour outside Cleveland, Ohio; then it's to Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Dubuque, Iowa (across the Mississippi River from the Wisconsin-Illinois border); and finally Bristow, Virginia, for a major rally with Bill Clinton.

Vice President Joe Biden plans two stops in Colorado, in Arvada (north of Denver) and then Pueblo (to the south).

We'll bring you the president's stop shortly, and then catch Romney in Dubuque at 12:30pm.

UPDATE: We're not getting a feed out of the first Obama event in Ohio, which is at a high school. In an attempt to redeem ourselves we'll watch Bill Clinton campaign for Obama in Virginia at 11am. Then we'll catch up with the president in rally mode later today.

Romney's first choice for veep was Christie – Politico

An intriguing story from Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei on Politico: Romney's initial pick for a running mate was New Jersey Governor Chris Christie – but Romney changed his mind in the final two weeks before making the call:

The strong internal push for Christie, and Romney’s initial instinct to pick him as his running mate, reflects how conflicted the nominee remained about choosing a running mate until the very end of the process. At least on the surface, Christie and Paul Ryan are about as opposite as two Republicans could be: a brash outsider from the Northeast versus a bookish insider from the heartland.

Christie of course has been making headlines for (among other things) his effusive praise of President Obama's handling of the Hurricane Sandy recovery effort. Christie guided Obama on a survey of Jersey Shore damage on Wednesday.

Why would news of Christie having been Romney's first pick come out now? The story could fill in part of the picture for undecided voters wondering why the popular Republican governor doesn't seem particularly in step with the Republican presidential nominee.

Good morning and welcome to the day in US politics, in the final weekend before election day on Tuesday. Here's a summary of where things stand as the candidates intensify their campaigning efforts in the battle for the swing states that will decide this election:

Governor Mitt Romney held what was reported to be biggest rally of his campaign last night in West Chester, Ohio (outside Cincinnati, right across the river from Kentucky). The Romney camp said 30,000 attended. Local police put the number at 18,000. 

Romney's aide DG Jackson tweeted a photo of the crowd:

Mitt's Body Man (@dgjackson)

UNBELIEVABLE!! Huge crowd in Ohio. I've never seen anything like this. Amazing support. twitter.com/dgjackson/stat…

November 3, 2012

Both former NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani and Senator John McCain were at the Ohio rally. Romney delivered an impassioned "closing argument" speech, full of fresh language, that invited the crowd to "put the past four years behind us".

"Did you see what President Obama said today?" Romney said. "He asked his supporters to vote for revenge – for revenge. Instead I ask the American people to vote for love of country."

At a Springfield, Ohio, rally yesterday the president told a crowd booing Romney's name, "Don't boo, vote. Vote! Voting is the best revenge."

A new NBC/WSJ/Marist poll, released at midnight last night, showed President Obama leading Governor Romney 51-45 in Ohio and 49-47 in Florida. 

Mark Murray (@mmurraypolitics)

@jaketapper: Is it the president overperforming in OH or Romney underperforming (due to auto bailout, Bain ads)? We'll find out in 3 days

November 3, 2012

In 2008 Obama beat McCain in Ohio 52-47.

Early voting continues in the state through the weekend.

ProgressOhio (@ProgressOhio)

Ohio Early Voting Hours:Saturday 8am-2pmSunday 1pm-5pmMonday 8am-2pmTo find your location go to:... fb.me/1fYVs2fH7

November 3, 2012

Obama held three rallies in Ohio yesterday. Three polls in Ohio on Friday put Obama ahead. In the latest, a CNN/ORC poll had the president on 50% to Romney's 47%.