[ cheers and applause ] ♪ >> hello ohio! it is good to be back in ohio!w, right before i came out, somebody happened to give me a buckeye for good luck. i love you back. now, before i begin, i want to say thank you to a few people who are joining us here today, your mayor michael coleman is here. former governor ted strickland is here. senator sherry brown is in the house. an american hero, john glenn, is with us. and i want to thank so many of our neighborhood team leaders for being here today. you guys will be the backbone of this campaign. i want the rest of you to join a team or become a leader yourself, because we are going to win this thing the old-fashioned way, door by door, block by block, neighborhood by neighborhood. in ohio four years ago you and i began a journey together. i didn't run and you didn't work your hearts out just to win an election. we came together to reclaim the basic bargain that built the largest middle class and most prosperous nation on earth. we came together because we believe that in america your success shouldn't be det

[ cheers and applause ] >>> hello, ohio! it is good to be back in ohio.e i came out somebody happened to give me a buckeye for good luck. i love you back. before i begin, i want to say thank you to a few people who are joining us here today. your mayor, michael coleman is here. former governor, ted strickland is here. senator sherrod brown is in the house. an american hero, john glen is with us. and i want to thank so many of our neighborhood team leaders for being here today. you guys will be the back bobonf this campaign. i want the rest of you to join the team or become a leader yourself because we are going to win this thing the old-fashioned way, door by door, block by block, neighborhood by neighborhood. you know, ohio four years ago, you and i began a journey together. i didn't run and you didn't work your hearts out just to win an election. we came together to reclaim the basic barring gains that built the largest middle class and the most prosperous nation on earth. we came together because we believe that in america your profession will be deter

. >> thank you, ohio. >>> and battleground politic was former ohio governor ted strickland and former virginia congressman tom davis. >>> then gauging the power of the taliban, al qaeda, and the afghan government with the chairs of the senate and house intelligence committees, democrat dianne feinstein and republican mike rogers. plus the anemic recovery and the election with the national journal's major garrett and janice rivlin. i'm candy crowley and this is "state of the union." >>> republican leaders and former rivals are gathering around mitt romney's candidacy, but the coalescing lacks a certain warp and fuzzy feature. >> compared to barack obama i would trust mitt romney 100 times over. >> he's the guy. he called and i called him back. we kind of traded some voice mails. >> he's the person that is going to go up against barack obama. it's pretty clear. and we need to win this race. >> i am joined by the latest candidate to exit the race, former house speaker newt gingrich. thanks for being here this morning. >> good to be here. >> my question is these have not been warm embrace

and the second wall is florida and ohio. right now those are margin of error states, and you have a situation where florida and ohio , the numbers are 46 percent to 47 percent, potentially a second wall he can knock down and third is colorado on one hand, and, virginia, on the other happened. romney needs to win both of those. if president obama splits those he retains the presidency. >>neil: how close is it? both of these guys are centering on the battleground states. governor romney in florida, how does that state look to you? >>guest: it is a poll-driven decision to go to florida and as i stated down if miami, i thought that mitt romney had left florida and did not address the issues of florida voters, with a florida survey showing president obama plus one in florida, and, again, in the margin error and other surveys have romney by one but it is a toss up. the problem for the president is 46 percent to 47 percent, are the numbers and we know from trends the antiobama vote is probably going to exceed what he gets in florid

that's a popular theme in ohio. then you'll also hear the broader messages you've heard him emphasize, a much more political speech. the first campaign -- official campaign rally to date. he's appearing as well with the first lady. so this crowd is excited, fredricka. >> so jessica, pretty excited crowd there. michelle obama will be leading things off very similar to how she was involved in the 2008 campaign, right? >> she's had a much more behind the scenes and less political presence as first lady. she's getting involved now attending many fundraisers. we're going to see her on the campaign trail increasingly in the next few months. she goes with the president from here to virginia next. we're going to see her on the campaign trail in the coming weeks and months, fredricka. she delivers a message that's even more clear in a way than the president does, more forcefully articulating what he has done sometimes than even the president does himself, fredricka. >> jessica yellin, thanks so much from columbus, ohio. we'l

you see president obama in the lead in ohio. that's because unemployment is going down in ohio. the other issue of course, president obama spending a lot of time talking about issue, of importance to women voters. that's to focus on those women in swing areas of swing states such as shaker height, ohio, northern virginia, the suburbs of philadelphia, the middle of florida. what's called the i-4 corridor. they're ephhoping even women vos who are ambivalent about the economy will be swayed by some issues they talk about on the trail. >> not surprisingly, the first lady traveling with the president today. a sign of things to come for this team? >> that's right, and her introduction of the president was a reminder to voters of how empathetic the president is, her husband, how much they can identify with his personal life story. these women, michelle obama and ann romney, will play a huge role in humanizing their husbands and we saw some of that today. we're going to see a lot more in the next six months. >> all right, jake, as always, thanks to you. first thing in the morn, jake wil

going to ohio can help. i would say ohio leans is to the -- it leans a little right at this point. >> yeah. although i'm predicting that obama is going to take ohio too because of the auto industry. but let me ask you about the vice president issues, and how that plays in the swing states. florida is obviously key, so key that he might actually pick senator rubio or jeb bush to be his running mate and if so does that have an impact? >> it's fair to say that if jeb bush were on that ticket it could help. jeb bush has more pull in the state, but you pick rubio or jeb bush in part to determine how you secure florida without investing too much time there obviously bush and rubio have other strengths and weaknesses. rubio can give at least a counter argument on the hispanic airways, and that's important because republicans have a massive chasm to comp state for. and jeb bush i think the bush name is an albatross and that's not considered enough in washington when you hear the establish laud bush's praise. >> i wo

columbus, ohio, and richmond, virginia.ning me now are two former governors of those states, virginia's doug wilder and ohio's ted strickland. good morning, gentleman. >> good morning. >> good morning. how are you. >> i'm good. governor strickland, i want to stick with you, because you were part of the warm you for the president before, and you might have had the toughest stuff against mitt romney of anybody i heard. i was at the rally. and here's one of the quotes i heard you say was, "mitt romney chose to take his wealth and invest it in the cayman islands in a swiss bank account. he did not choose to invest in america, he chose to enrich himself by putting his resources somewhere else." that's pretty harsh stuff. do you think that's the campaign rhetoric that the obama campaign should be using against romney? >> well, chuck, it's factual. that's what he did. he wanted to be president, he wants to be president, and yet he took his wealth and put it in foreign establishments. what if every american did that? what would tha

florida, virginia and ohio. the president leads in all three but in each below 50% and romney narrowed the imagine since we pommed all these of these states earlier. down from an eight didn't point lead? january. down in virginia from a double-digit freed march and in ohio the president is up by six points. 48-42. led romney by 12 until our march ohio number. look at numbers, call it unlikely voter number, not at likely voters yet, a imagine of error game. obama has a two-point lead in florida. three-point lead in virginia. four-point lead in ohio. notice the president's number doesn't move. sits in 48% in all three. approval rating in these states. flori florida, 48% approve. same in january. virginia, 49% up from 49% in ohio in march. down slightly in virginia in a poll that gave him a whopping 17-point lead at that time. now, striking in all these polls combined with our new nbc news/"wall street journal" results, consistency. bottom line, is 48% a good or bad thing? 48% is the nice edge when it comes to an i

ohio, ohio, ohio. qul worry so much about just one state. this one state could settle the election.o republican has won the white house in modern times without carrying ohio. republican governor, john casey, joins us to discuss the 2012 political terrain. you are in the midst of perhaps the most competitive battleground state. vice president biden was there to say romney was a bad guy. >> then, there is the romney philosophy which says slong tass the government helps the guys at the top to do well, workers in small businesses and communities can fend for themselves but the country will be okay if the big guy is doing well. >> you hear this coming. romney is rich. he is greedy, he doesn't care about you, the guy that works with his hands. what does governor romney need to do to counter that? >> well, john, look. this state of ohio had a near death experience in the last few years. we came in. we lost 600,000 jobs. 400,000 in the last four years. our credit was going down the drain. we had an $8 billion hold. working with the legislature, with he were able to balance the budget, cut t

congressman tim ryan of ohio. glad to have you with us. >> good to be with you, ed. >> tell you what, i'm watching vice president biden. i'm cranked up. why do you think he did that? >> all reports i've gotten from phone calls back home, from labor leaders and business people back home, they said he have on fire. some say it was the best speech they've ever heard a politician give. so he was on fire. i think it's the fact that the administration has been treated so unfairly in so many ways. here is you are, miles away from an auto plant, and you have mitt romney saying that he would have let the auto industry collapse. now you're in the backyard of a lot of these auto workers, and they know what has happened, and they know what the difference is between a romney administration and an obama administration. they've already benefited from it. >> that crowd wanted that today. is that fair to say? >> yeah, they want someone to fight for them. and i think they're starting to see that this administration has been fightin

what about here in ohio? check this out, a brand new poll from quinnipiac, when it comes to the economy, mitt romney has a slight advantage or president obama right here in the crucial battle ground state. >> all that hammering home of his business executive background i guess, maybe folks are listening. how many trips has the president made to ohio now? i have lost track. >> reporter: 20 already, this is 21 to ohio. >> must be a very important state. paul thank you very much. >>> he fled house arrest in china, now the activist who appealed to president obama and hillary clinton is under guard at a hospital in beijing. his next stop might be the u.s. the chinese government says chen guangcheng can apply for a travel visa. >>> to canada, canadian hang gliding instructor has been granted bail. the woman in the glider dropped to the ground. investigators say the instructor may have tried to hide the key evidence by swallowing a memory card that has video of the fall. it's now in police custody. >>> visionary, tr

and then you can start telling us what if obama loses ohio and florida? you start the game and hit that there. you can say, okay, we'll give romney florida and also ohio. that gives him 244 electoral votes. what does that mean for president obama? let's say he takes nevada and ohio, as chuck todd says because of the hispanic vote. then he needs pennsylvania, democrats have won since 1992. that gives him 266. all he needs is virginia or north carolina and he gets the seal to become the president of the united states. then you can submit your idea, you can sending it to us. we may put it on air and share your thoughts on what your analysis is. chris, if you like to play along

ohio lost 2 house seat as a result of the 2010 census. presidential candidate was forced to run in newly created district and lost in the democratic primary in march. now it looks like the congressional career could last a little bit longer if he mavs to washington state. dan springer with the story. >> ohio congressman kucinich politician without a home. squeezed out when ohio lost 2 seats, kucinich was beaten by fellow democrat marsy and her district in the march primary. now anti-war group in washington state, 2500 miles away, is trying to get kucinich to move west. >> we believe we have over 1,000 peace activity nightcast seattle and do anything in our power to help dennis wherever he runs to remain in congress so his voice would remain in considering. >> he was one of the loudest voices in congress during the run up to the iraq war. still the washington state democratic party chairman is not among his fans. in a press release dwight powell said if kucinich runs he will be remembered as the narcissist who lost 2 congressional races in

he was nominated to be governor of ohio. and he ran for governor of ohio from exile. but he lost by a landslide. something like 100,000 votes. when he came back into the union, lincoln ordered his military commanders, leave this guy alone. let's not make a martyr out of him again. this is a cartoon from 1863 showing president lincoln and president davis playing badminton. neither of them wants him in their nation and they're trying to bat him back and forth. now, congress had to react to these situations. we're going to talk more about this next week, congress' reaction. but i just want to tell you a little bit about how congress reacted. congress began debating the civil liberties issue and the suspensions of habeas corpus as early as the summer of 1861. but members of congress, as is often the case, couldn't come up with a solution. some people in congress thought, you know what, lincoln is doing what he needs to do and we just need to let him do it. it's legal, what he's doing. other members of congress thought, lincoln's doing what he needs to do but he's doing it

maybe slightly different emphasis in ohio. there's a very heavy emphasis on the auto bailout, manufacturing, because 1 in 8 jobs there is connected in some ways to manufacturing. but the theme you have heard him deliver will -- the overarching theme will be the same, which from the campaign will be its idea that the president has taken the economy from a place where he was handed it where the economy was hemorrhages jobs and he did what he could to stop the hemorrhaging, to turn it around, and he cites a lot of data about private sector job growth, he argues it will get better in the future. one of the things you'll note is in the -- and shood out to me, in his message in ohio, he's critical of the republican congress. he was critical of mitt romney, but his attack on mitt romney was not bitingly negative. it was a criticism of his policy and his approach. the attitude was more, mitt romney doesn't get it for middle class americans. here's what he had to say about mitt romney. >> when a woman in iowa shared the story of her fi

so in the spring of 1863 ambrose burnside was in charge of the department of ohio which included ohio, indiana, parts of kentucky and other areas. he looked around him and saw many copperheads, people who opposed the war, people who opposed emancipation and spoke out against lincoln and heish autoed a military order, and i will read you a little bit of it in april 1863. it is general orders number 38. listen to what he does and see if you have any reaction to it. the habit of declaring sympathies for the enemy will not be allowed in this department. persons committing such offenses will be at once arrested and with a view to being tried as above stated, that is with the military commission or sent beyond the lines into the lines of their friends. people who sneak out or sympathize with the enemy will be tried by military commission or sent, banished into the confederacy. it must be distinctly understood that treason expressed or implied will not be tolerated in this department. listen again. it must be distinctly understood that treason expressed or implied will not be tolerated in th

so the campaign is pouring resources into ohio to keep it competitive. the state director has been here since 2009. his message to voters, the president's auto bailout boosted the local economy. >> one out of every eight jobs in ohio is related to the auto industry. >> reporter: there are 18 field offices and romney opens his next week and democrats say they will try to use that local presence to win over undecided voters. >> it's voter to voter contact between a screen door and that kind of validation between a volunteer of that neighborhood gives us a huge advantage. >> reporter: then there is social media 2012, a step up from the last campaign. ashley bryant, a cincinnati native, is the state's digital immediate kra director. >> we're showing the president doing the stance which is fantastic to get people excited for saturday. >> reporter: she runs an ohio-based campaign blog and twitter accounts with messages local i'd localized to ohio voters. >> we're usually covering all of our platforms. we're posting it on the blog, flicker, and everything in be

by the way, they already lost ohio back in 2004. thanks to don king and thanks to other ministers in kioga county. if mitt romney walks into the white house and says, he doesn't evolve, we won't evolve. he walks into the white house and says he's been an all, although it's not good for the cause. here's the problem. i don't disagree with what mayor brown is saying. i understand what the calculation is. but i think the calculation is now incorrect. you can only make this political calculation when people don't generally see it as a political calculation. if people know that you're not actually speaking your mind and your heart, if you are inauthentic about this issue, and it is an important issue to some people -- a lot of people -- then you're doing yourself harm. you're actually harming your electrical prospects. >> everybody wants to get in on the act here. here is former dnc chair. he supports the president on gay marriage. here's ed rendell. >> he should man up and say, this is what i believe. he doesn't lose any african-america

ohio is a battleground state. democrat and republican candidates. the president won ohio by 5 points in 2008. we expect him to win again this year. most polls have him ahead. it's going to be a tough race. republicans have to win ohio in order to be president of the united states. obama doesn't have to win ohio to be president. we're going to be competitive here because of romney wins we want to beat him in ohio. but it's an important thing for everybody. it's always going to be a battleground state and be close. >> i always wondered. president obama has visited ohio 21 times since he took office. i'm sure romney will be there dozens of times. does it help when candidates visit states that much? >> i think it brings a focus and attention to the campaign. and obviously, we had a huge rally for the president this weekend. over 14,000 people showed up to rally the president and to cheer him on. those people will be helping the president deliver his message to the rest of the voters in ohio. i think it's important to

ohio could be a problematic state for president obama.the president's numbers are very, very good with lots of different voting blocks, but we do know that the president has historically had a difficult time with white male voters, particularly of a certain age. and we see those voters, for example, in ohio. it is a difficult state for the obama campaign. you have to assume that the romney is going to put as much money into states like ohio where he already has an advantage in terms of demographics to make sure he can do everything he can to win that state. president obama is going to do well with women. the chances of the gender gap between now and november dissipating by even a small margin is very action very small. the president is probably going to do better with latinos. he is probably going to do better with single women with single men. romney has to do all he can with white males, evangelcals, people who are very, very socially conservative. >> that's why you can imagine what kind of ads we are going to see between now and novemb

he was with president obama in ohio on saturday.nks for coming on the show tonight. >> it was great seeing the president in front of 14,000, pretty enthusiastic ohioans. thanks. >> now the president went right after mitt romney. was that a surprise to you, and will it play well into ohio? >> yeah, governor romney's got a bunch of things he's got to answer to. he's got everything from his offshore accounts to his support of the budget that really goes after medicare and goes after meals on wheels and food stamps and all kinds of middle class and working class and programs, too, for the poor. but he's also in ohio. governor romney's got to answer his opposition to the auto rescue. he's got to answer his support for rolling back collective bargaining rights which is a shot directly to middle class. he's got a lot of explaining to do in ohio, and i think you are going to see the president making the contrast between what governor romney believes and what the president believes. and i'm there with him because i have an opponent the same

why do you say ohio is a critical swing state in this election? >> reporter: well, ohio is always a battle ground and it's a battleground that sometimes goes republican and the economy has struggled for many years. the unemployment rate is lower than the national average. i would say this is a different kind of year. we always in the political media say the way ohio goes, so goes the nation. this obama team is making the case that they in fact believe that they can win the presidency without winning ohio, that they have other routes -- the 270 battleground map that they need but still, as you can tell by the president's presence here today, they are not giving up here and many argue that here in columbus, this is the most swing area of this swing state so this area will get a lot of attention and the president is deploying a lot of sort of new digital media resources at this event here so there will be a lot of new technology deployed to keep your eye out for as the rally is unveiled today, randi. >> jessica yellin, thank you for that report. and

today, i wanted to play more of ohio rallying the troops, the faithful in ohio which we both would agreehe critical state. >> ground zero. >> i resent when they talk about families like mine that i grew up in. i resent the fact that they think we're talking about we're en envy. it's job envy, it's wealth envy. that we don't dream. my mother and father believed that if my brother or sister wanted to be a millionaire, they could be a millionaire. my mother and father dreamed as much as any rich guy dreams. they don't get us. they don't get who we are. >> does he get who the voters are? is he connecting? >> i think first of all, most of us have met or worked with the vice president know he's an extremely likable guy. i think that his resume translates well for blue collar audiences. that's who he's talking to there. in that respect, he's kind of like the best lawyer with the worst case because he's got to convince people whose incomes have been stagnant under this administration and whose children have to pay the $5 trillion in debt added under this administration that this is a good econom

he up by 10 and 12 in ohio. that is the challenge their trying to break. >> one more thing i want to take these states as a whole. the scary thing about these -- look, i put these three here because florida was the be all end all. >> how did tim russet, and then he said ohio, and listen, i think it's virginia. >> you agree? >> sure. >> the president can win without ohio and florida. it is hard for him -- there's a way to get there without -- >> that's what i want to spend time in virginia for. the really tough question, why is obama unable to get above 48 in job performance? >> the economic news, though better, it still mediocre at best. and the president owns the economy. he can't not -- the president said his campaign would be about, forward, what's his most aggressive attack about romney? back ward. he did not fill in, i believe, what his second term will be about, what has been accomplished that has changed people's live first the better. what is the payoff for them -- >> did he say things were getting bette

voting rights under attack in ohio.194 restricts early voting, limits distribution of absentee ballots. poll workers not required to direct voters to proper precincts. i mean, this, to me, is a dangerous way of rolling back again a lot of the voting rights that we're seeing around the country and this is a bill in ohio. >> yes, senator durbin and i were in cleveland today with congresswoman fudge to discuss this bill. we had a senate judiciary subcommittee hearing on this legislation. really is a solution looking for a problem. there's not massive voter fraud. people don't wake up at 8:00 in the morning and vote in cleveland and then drive to medina and vote again and drive to norwalk and vote again. that's not where fraud is. and to pass all this -- these laws. and what's discouraging, what's disappointing, reverend sharpton, about this is all of these laws in highway hoir s is laws about early voting were written by republican legislature with democratic support, signed by a republican governor. there was no argument