WASHINGTON - Election Day is finally here, the final opinion polls are in and now it’s time for Americans to make their way to the voting booth — but will weather be a factor?

According to the latest forecast maps, most of the country will not have adverse weather conditions, but there could be rain showers in two battleground states.

Good weather historically has helped Democrats.

Virginia, which has voted Republican since 1964, is now a toss-up state between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama and will likely see showers most of the day stretching from Newport News north to the suburbs outside Washington, D.C., and west toward Roanoke.

Parts of North Carolina, a state that has been leaning slightly toward McCain, will experience showers during the morning.

Meanwhile Florida, Ohio, Missouri and Pennsylvania, all battleground states critical to a McCain victory, should be clear. Other key states like Colorado and New Mexico, where Obama hopes to help his cause, are not expected to have bad weather.

Out West, Weather.com reported that showers are expected in Portland, Oregon, and Seattle.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

- Photo credit: Reuters/Joe Skipper (Voters in Boca Raton, Fla. line up to vote on Tuesday)

ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico - Democrats are getting nervous — and Barack Obama seems to sense it.

The Illinois senator, fresh from a trip to Hawaii where he picked up a cold, has been rallying supporters in the past two days, urging them not to be anxious about Republican attacks that have helped lift Arizona Sen. John McCain in the polls.

“Everywhere I go people have told me, ‘Oh, I’m getting nervous. The Republicans — they’re so mean … What are we going to do?’” Obama told a town hall meeting with some 1,800 people on Monday.

Obama said Republicans didn’t know how to govern but did know how to run a negative campaign.

“It’s not going to work this time,” he said. Echoing a similar line he used at a fundraiser on Sunday, he assured the crowd he intended to win.

Meanwhile, the Illinois senator is fighting a cold, which he traced back to the time he spent last week with his young daughters while they were on vacation in Hawaii.

“The only thing about daughters is that when you hang out with them a lot and they get a cold, somehow they end up passing it off to you,” he said to laughter at an earlier event on Monday.

“Not just daughters!” a participant shouted out.

“That’s true for sons, too?” Obama joked back. “All right, I just want to be clear.”

It’s not a great time for the Illinois senator to be sick. He is expected to announce a vice presidential running mate in the coming days and will need to be in top form for the party’s convention in Denver next week, when he officially becomes the Democrats’ White House nominee.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young (Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama removes his jacket as he arrives for a town hall event in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Aug. 18, 2008)

LAS CRUCES, N.M. - Democrats will eventually unite once the hard-fought presidential nomination battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is resolved but that process may take time, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said on Monday. 

“There’s going to be a need for healing,” Richardson, a former White House hopeful who is backing Obama. 

Richardson, who had served as energy secretary and ambassador to the United Nations in former President Bill Clinton’s administration, remained on the fence for several weeks before deciding to support Obama, an Illinois senator, two months ago.

After announcing his decision, he talked of a tense phone call with Hillary Clinton when he broke the news to her. James Carville, a longtime adviser to Bill Clinton, called Richardson a “Judas.” 

Obama, who now holds a lead in delegates over Clinton that probably is insurmountable, was on the campaign trail with Richardson on Monday. The governor introduced the Illinois senator at a Memorial Day veterans forum in Las Cruces, New Mexico. 

Richardson, who is of Latino descent, is expected to provide a boost to Obama’s efforts to court Hispanic voters. 

Campaigning in Puerto Rico last weekend, Obama sprinkled some Spanish phrases into his speech. Richardson said the senator’s Spanish is “passable” but the effort is appreciated by these voters. 

Although Latinos gravitated toward Clinton in many primary races, Richardson said Obama can boost his support by increasing his visibility with the community. 

Listing some of the messages that will help Obama, Richardson said, “He talks about respect. He’s a minority himself” and comes from a family of modest means.

- Photo credit: Reuters/Edwin Montilva (New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, shown during an April 2008 trip to Venezuela.)

WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush will hit the campaign trail next week to rustle up some badly needed cash for Republican candidates — including presidential hopeful John McCain — but catching a glimpse of him in action will be fleeting.

Bush will crisscross the Rocky Mountains Tuesday through Thursday from New Mexico to Arizona to Utah to Kansas raising money for McCain at three events and Republican congressional candidates at two others. They are all closed to the media.

“The reason that they’re closed is that the McCain campaign has a practice of having their fundraisers as closed press,” said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. Bush has permitted the media attend fundraisers at hotels and other similar venues but not at private residences (like the other two fundraisers on the trip).

Bush and McCain will attend one fundraiser together (in Arizona), she said,  but it remains unclear whether the two will be seen in public together.

“Stay tuned for the details … when we arrive or when we depart, I think there will be a chance,” Perino said. McCain has lagged his Democratic rivals in raising campaign cash — he pulled in $18.5 million in April while New York Sen. Hillary Clinton brought in $21 million and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama received $30.7 million.

McCain has been trying to shake accusations from Democrats that he would represent a third term of Bush, so he could choose to avoid a photo opportunity during their get-together on Tuesday.

Congressional Republicans have also been facing a fairly grim outlook, with more than two dozen members of the House of Representatives leaving, either retiring or seeking another office.  That has made it even harder to narrow or reverse the 236-199 advantage Democrats have in the House. Meanwhile, Republicans in the Senate must defend 23 seats while Democrats have 12 seats to guard. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/Jonathan Ernst (McCain listens to Bush at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in April.)

SALEM, Ore. - Conventional wisdom suggests New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson’s endorsement of Sen. Barack Obama ’s bid for the Democratic nomination matters most among Hispanic voters where, as a Hispanic himself, Richardson could have most influence.

Following that logic, the endorsement would have made more impact before Texas primary on March 5 or, even better, before Super Tuesday’s primary in California. Sen. Hillary Clinton won the big Hispanic vote in both states handily.
The point was made by Clinton’s campaign strategist Mark Penn.

“You know, I think New Mexico is a state that, actually, we won,” he said. “And if Senator Obama’s campaign wanted to follow what they tell everyone, they certainly would be telling Governor Richardson to be casting his pledged delegate to us.

“But I think that, you know, perhaps the time when he could have been most effective has long since passed and — long since passed.”

But Richardson, who had been in the Democratic presidential race until dropping out in January , told a news conference that point of view was “unfortunate” and reflective of an outmoded politics of ethnic identification that he said Obama opposes.

President Bill Clinton appointed Richardson energy secretary and U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and the Clintons had courted his endorsement assiduously.

Richardson called Sen. Clinton on Friday to explain why he was supporting her opponent and it was a difficult phone call.

“Let me say we have had better conversations,” he said. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/Richard Clement (Obama (left) and Richardson wave to the crowd at a rally in Portland, Ore., March 21 after the New Mexico governor endorseed Obama’s presidential campaign.)