Obama's General Election Plan: Sign Up Voters

Barack's massive registration drive could 'change the math'
By Sam Gale Rosen,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 2, 2008 2:34 PM CDT
Obama's General Election Plan: Sign Up Voters
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama D-Ill., smiles as he shakes hands after speaking at a town hall meeting at Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., Tuesday, April 1, 2008.    (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Barack Obama's general-election strategy is to rejigger the electorate in his favor by signing up massive numbers of new voters—mainly young and African-American voters. Suspicious Dems point out that a similar effort failed John Kerry in 2004, but, reports Politico, there's legitimate reason to think Obama might be able to pull it off.

Unlike past candidates who promised to get out the African-American and youth votes, Obama is actually succeeding—one aide points to voter-registration efforts in South Carolina that were "such a big part of getting us to that 28-point margin of victory." The campaign plans to replicate those efforts in "every state where there's large pockets of under-35s and African-Americans." (More Barack Obama stories.)

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