President George W. Bush appeared to be making a move on Democratic turf in the country's heartland but his challenger John Kerry fought hard in other key swing states ahead of Tuesday's election, polls showed Friday.
With surveys showing the race virtually dead even, the candidates criss-crossed crucial battlegrounds, defending territory won in the 2000 election or seeking to snatch a state or two from the other's column.
Their campaign itineraries provided a clear indication of the election's epicenter, including stops in the midwestern states of Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota and Michigan, which went Democratic four years ago.
Also on the schedule were three states Bush narrowly won the first time out: the southeastern state of Florida that turned the 2000 ballot, Ohio in the Midwest and New Hampshire in the northeast.
Both sides were trying to stitch together a majority of the 538 electoral votes that decide the presidency and are awarded in separate state contests run mostly on a winner-take-all basis. Bush won four years ago by 271-266.
Polls in recent weeks had shown the race boiling down to 10 states, with a total of 118 electoral votes. But traditionally Democratic Michigan (17 electors) has been a late surprise with Bush moving up on the senator from Massachusetts.
A survey by Zogby International gave Bush a 47-45 percent lead in Michigan while the Rasmussen group showed him whittling down Kerry's edge from five points to two. Two other polls gave the Democrat a modest lead of four to six points.
Zogby showed the Republican edging ahead of Kerry in the north-central state of Minnesota (10 electors) by 46-45 percent, a four-point swing in a day. The Humphrey Institute had Bush up 47-44 percent, while Rasmussen had the race tied.
The state of Pennsyvlania (21), a "must-win" for Kerry also appeared to be tightening, with Zogby reporting a dead heat and other polls split on who was ahead four days before the election.
But state polls gave Kerry a shot of capturing Florida, which handed Bush the presidency in 2000 by a bitterly disputed 537 votes, and Ohio, which no Republican has ever lost and gone on to take the White House.
Also raising eyebrows was the Pacific island state of Hawaii, whose four electors had once been considered sure to go to Kerry. But recent polls pointed to a much tighter outcome.
So the Democrats have started to advertise in the state and dispatched former vice president and presidential candidate Al Gore along with Kerry's daughter Alexandra. Vice President Dick Cheney was also reportedly headed to Hawaii.
Three national polls showed Bush slightly ahead of Kerry.
Fox News Channel gave Bush a 50 to 45 percent lead among likely voters but just a 48-46 percent edge among registered voters in a poll with a three-percentage-point margin of error.
A George Washington University poll also gave Bush a 50-45 percent advantage among likely voters, while a Washington Post daily tracking poll showed Bush ahead 50 to 47 percent among likely voters. The two polls have a margin of error of about three percentage points.
Eric Davis, a presidential historian and political science professor at Middlebury College in Vermont, said that a race Bush once looked on the verge of breaking open had become excruciatingly tight.
"A month ago I was talking about Bush in the 300-320 range [of electoral votes] maybe even 330," Davis told reporters.
RSS