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Obama drew almost 20,000 to the arena for a speech that brought the audience to its feet when he spoke out against lobbyists, promised to spend more on students and said he opposed the Iraq war from the beginning. A couple of parents hoisted small children onto their shoulders for a better view.
The Illinois senator tied his campaign in with the populist politics of the late Minnesota Sen. Paul Wellstone.
Obama vowed to bring U.S. troops back from Iraq and lamented the war’s cost in lives and dollars.
“Imagine what we could have spent with that $2 trillion,” he said. “Every bridge, road, school, hospital in America, we could have rebuilt. We could have put our people back to work. We could have sent our kids to college. We could have trained teachers and nurses and doctors, laid broadband lines in rural communities. That would have made us more safe.”
Many got up early to get good seats. Iman Mohamed arrived at the downtown Minneapolis arena more than six hours before the doors opened. Waiting at the head of the line to get in, the 18-year-old University of Minnesota student said she wouldn’t have missed seeing a potential commander-in-chief.
“I feel like if this person becomes president, and he’s going to live up to what he’s saying he’s going to live up to, why not? I want to hear it for myself,” Mohamed said. “I want to see it.”
Obama’s Minnesota campaign put some of those waiting for seats to work calling voters on their cell phones and urging them to vote in Tuesday’s precinct caucuses.
Minnesota is about to get attention from other candidates, too. Hillary Clinton will visit Minneapolis Sunday, and Ron Paul comes to the University of Minnesota on Monday.
On the Democratic side, Clinton was slightly ahead of Obama in the only statewide poll in the final week, but supporters of John Edwards were an unknown quantity after he dropped out. For Republicans, John McCain had a solid lead, followed by Mike Huckabee and Romney.
Before Obama’s rally, lines for those with tickets wrapped around the arena, jumped a street and stretched back blocks over a freeway overpass.
Jan Young, 56, of Maple Grove, said the size and diversity of the crowd was unlike anything she had seen in politics in her lifetime.
“It’s almost like the Messiah, you know?” said Young, a woman who said she originally backed Clinton but was drawn to Obama over the last year. “People really, really want change, and you feel it. You don’t just hear it — you feel something coming from him.”
Later Saturday in Edina, several hundred gathered in the indoor courtyard of a private office complex to see Romney. Their time with the former Massachussetts governor was brief — his speech lasted just nine minutes, but hit his main campaign themes.
“I’ll do the work to protect American jobs, to strengthen our industry, to keep our taxes down, to make sure that trade around the world is on a level playing field,” Romney said. “I’ll make sure immigration works for us with good, legal immigration and I’ll stop illegal immigration.”
Fran Bator drove an hour from East Bethel for the event. Bator said she plans to attend the caucus for the first time on Tuesday to support Romney because she likes his experience as a businessman.
His visit to Minnesota counted for something, too.
“Typically we have the Democrats. We can go see them because they always come here. But we don’t get to see a very clear Republican this early in the race,” Bator said.
