President Barack Obama returned to battleground Virginia late Saturday night for a rally with former President Bill Clinton in Prince William County, a booming bellwether in Northern Virginia.
“Now it’s all up to you,” Obama said, encouraging the campaign’s supporters to keep pushing through Tuesday, knocking on doors and making extra phone calls.
“You’ve got the power — and that’s why I need you, Virginia. Don’t get tired, don’t get weary,” Obama said.
The president told the crowd he wants to be a champion of middle-class families.
“All those kids in inner cities and small farm towns — in the valleys of Ohio, in these rolling Virginia hills — kids dreaming of becoming scientists or doctors or engineers or entrepreneurs or diplomats, or businessmen or even a president of the United States, they need a champion in Washington, because they don’t have lobbyists,” he said.
Ahead of the president’s arrival, musician Dave Matthews played an acoustic set at the venue, Jiffy Lube Live in Bristow. Four years ago, Obama kicked off his general election campaign at the same site in western Prince William, then known as the Nissan Pavilion.
Before catching up with Obama in Prince William, Clinton campaigned Saturday in Roanoke and in Chesapeake. Heading into Saturday’s events, Clinton had made 26 appearances for the president, according to the Obama campaign.
In introducing Obama, Clinton likened Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s positions on the auto bailout to the contortions of Cirque de Soleil.
Obama’s itinerary Saturday had him heading from Ohio to Milwaukee and Dubuque, Iowa, and ending the day in Bristow.
In the battleground of Ohio, Obama said Tuesday’s election is “not just a choice between two candidates or two parties, it’s a choice between two different visions for America.” The president offered himself as the candidate voters can trust, renewing his criticism of Romney for what he said were misleading ads suggesting that automakers are shifting U.S. jobs to China.
Vice President Joe Biden could have spoken for all sides when he told a crowd in Arvada, Colo.: “Man, I’m so ready to win this election.”
Biden worked in a new dig at Romney, tied to this weekend’s shift back to standard time: “It’s Mitt Romney’s favorite time of year, because he gets to turn the clock back. He wants to turn that clock back so desperately. This time he can really do it.”
In Prince William, Obama returned to the county where his election-eve rally in 2008 at the Prince William County Fairground drew an estimated 85,000 people.
If Republicans hope to retake Virginia at the presidential level Tuesday, they will have to chip away at Obama’s dominance in the state’s population centers such as Prince William and Loudoun counties, the fastest-growing localities in the state. Romney has made a push in both counties, hoping to cut back Obama’s advantage coming out of Northern Virginia.
In 2008, Obama became the first Democratic presidential candidate in 44 years to carry Prince William and Loudoun, its neighbor to the north. Obama won Prince William by 25,000 votes and Loudoun by 11,500.
“Now it’s all up to you,” Obama said, encouraging the campaign’s supporters to keep pushing through Tuesday, knocking on doors and making extra phone calls.
“You’ve got the power — and that’s why I need you, Virginia. Don’t get tired, don’t get weary,” Obama said.
The president told the crowd he wants to be a champion of middle-class families.
“All those kids in inner cities and small farm towns — in the valleys of Ohio, in these rolling Virginia hills — kids dreaming of becoming scientists or doctors or engineers or entrepreneurs or diplomats, or businessmen or even a president of the United States, they need a champion in Washington, because they don’t have lobbyists,” he said.
Ahead of the president’s arrival, musician Dave Matthews played an acoustic set at the venue, Jiffy Lube Live in Bristow. Four years ago, Obama kicked off his general election campaign at the same site in western Prince William, then known as the Nissan Pavilion.
Before catching up with Obama in Prince William, Clinton campaigned Saturday in Roanoke and in Chesapeake. Heading into Saturday’s events, Clinton had made 26 appearances for the president, according to the Obama campaign.
In introducing Obama, Clinton likened Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s positions on the auto bailout to the contortions of Cirque de Soleil.
Obama’s itinerary Saturday had him heading from Ohio to Milwaukee and Dubuque, Iowa, and ending the day in Bristow.
In the battleground of Ohio, Obama said Tuesday’s election is “not just a choice between two candidates or two parties, it’s a choice between two different visions for America.” The president offered himself as the candidate voters can trust, renewing his criticism of Romney for what he said were misleading ads suggesting that automakers are shifting U.S. jobs to China.
Vice President Joe Biden could have spoken for all sides when he told a crowd in Arvada, Colo.: “Man, I’m so ready to win this election.”
Biden worked in a new dig at Romney, tied to this weekend’s shift back to standard time: “It’s Mitt Romney’s favorite time of year, because he gets to turn the clock back. He wants to turn that clock back so desperately. This time he can really do it.”
In Prince William, Obama returned to the county where his election-eve rally in 2008 at the Prince William County Fairground drew an estimated 85,000 people.
If Republicans hope to retake Virginia at the presidential level Tuesday, they will have to chip away at Obama’s dominance in the state’s population centers such as Prince William and Loudoun counties, the fastest-growing localities in the state. Romney has made a push in both counties, hoping to cut back Obama’s advantage coming out of Northern Virginia.
In 2008, Obama became the first Democratic presidential candidate in 44 years to carry Prince William and Loudoun, its neighbor to the north. Obama won Prince William by 25,000 votes and Loudoun by 11,500.