WILMINGTON, Del. -- With fewer than 2 percent of the delegates needed for a presidential nomination available here, campaigning in tiny Delaware would hardly seem worth the Interstate 95 toll money.
But Michelle Obama was in the state Thursday, giving a rousing stump speech that turned out to be a warm-up act. Her husband, Sen. Barack Obama, will stop in Wilmington tomorrow, making a Mid-Atlantic appearance on his final push before Tuesday's primaries.
Delaware is one of several small states receiving big attention leading up to Super Tuesday, when more than 20 states will vote in the closest thing to a national primary.
California is the biggest prize, and New York, Illinois, New Jersey and Georgia offer large numbers of delegates. Close races in both parties mean that leading candidates need every advantage. States such as Alaska, Kansas and Utah are suddenly valuable.
"Literally every single one of the states is in play," said Erik J. Schramm, a Democratic operative who has run several statewide races in Delaware. "You can see the energy and feel the buzz."
On the Democratic side, Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton have the money and organizational strength to compete in places otherwise ignored in years when nominees were decided earlier or there was a clear front-runner.
Ads and fliers
For Delaware, that means advertisements on television, fliers landing on doorsteps and armies of paid staff members and volunteers fanning out in neighborhoods.
"The strategy is not only to win as many delegates as possible; it's to win as many states as possible," said Chris Lu, an Obama Senate staff member on leave to work on the Delaware campaign effort. "It's trying to show we are running a national campaign ... that we can run in any state, and we can win in any state."
Clinton's Delaware campaign denies feeling pressure from the Obama visits.
"We have a great ground game going on," said her state spokeswoman, Emily Cain.
Clinton is running television ads and will "technically" appear Monday night in Wilmington, one of 22 cities participating in a national town hall meeting broadcast on the Hallmark Channel in a time slot purchased by the campaign, Cain said.
Local activists say the Obama and Clinton campaigns stepped up their Delaware operations about two weeks ago, adding paid campaign workers and developing advertising strategies.
