Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain hunted for support in the key industrial states of Ohio and Pennsylvania yesterday in the final 48 hours of a White House race that appeared to be tilting to Mr Obama.
The Illinois senator planned rallies in the three biggest cities in the showdown state of Ohio, and launched a new advertisement emphasising ties between Mr McCain and unpopular Vice President Dick Cheney.
"I'm delighted to support John McCain," Mr Cheney says in the ad, shot at a campaign event on Saturday in Wyoming. He also praises Mr McCain's running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. "That's not the change we need," the ad's announcer said.
Mr McCain trails Mr Obama in every national opinion poll and in many crucial battleground states ahead of next Tuesday's vote, but aides said he was closing the gap at the end of a campaign that has lasted nearly two years and cost more than $2 billion.
"What we're in for is a slam-bang finish," McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said on "Fox News Sunday."
"He's been counted out before and won these kinds of states, and we're in the process of winning them right now," Mr Davis said of big battleground states like Ohio, Florida and Virginia that are the focus of the race's final days as each candidate searches for the 270 electoral votes needed to win.
Opinion polls offer few signs to back up Mr Davis's claim. Mr McCain is struggling to defend about a dozen states won by Republican President George W. Bush in 2004, and polls show Mr Obama ahead or running even in key states like Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Colorado, Indiana, North Carolina and Nevada.
A new poll in Ohio showed Mr McCain with a two-point advantage, although other surveys gave Mr Obama a narrow edge.
Mr McCain's prime hope of a breakthrough in a Democratic-leaning state is Pennsylvania, won by Democrats in the last four presidential elections. Mr Obama has led in every opinion poll in the state this month, although his edge has narrowed from double digits to four to seven points.
"We were there yesterday. We're going back. It's a state that I think we can snatch from the Democrats and really be a part of our coalition for the election," Mr Davis said.
Mr Davis also said Mr McCain had seen a "huge surge" in support in recent days in three Western battlegrounds -Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada - and declared each of those states dead even. Public polls in the last week show Mr Obama ahead in all three by a minimum of four percentage points. Mr Obama is playing offense in the last two days of the campaign, hitting Ohio, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia - all won by Mr Bush in 2004.