DURHAM -- The Obama campaign launched its campus crusade Tuesday, hoping once again to both win and mobilize college students who were a critical part of the president's coalition four years ago.
The president's re-election campaign held what it called a national "youth summit" Tuesday evening at N.C. Central University aimed at the historically black colleges - part pep rally, part conversation to re-engage students in the election.
"Tell your friends that President Barack Obama saved the U.S. economy from collapse," said U.S. Rep. G.K. Butterfield of Wilson, one of the president's top lieutenants in the state. "You must register every unregistered student and get ready for this fight."
More than 700 students jammed into B.N. Duke Auditorium, with some lining up several hours before the event to be sure to get a seat. Hundreds were turned away. Students from more than 100 historically black campuses joined online, sending in questions by the social media tool of Twitter.
In a state teeming with college campuses - a state that Obama carried by a slim 14,000-vote margin in 2008 - the college vote could make the difference.
Underscoring the importance of the college vote, the president's campaign dispatched two of its senior figures to Durham: White House adviser and long-time Obama friend Valarie Jarrett, and Jim Messina, the national campaign manager from Chicago.
They both sought to make the case that Obama had lived up to campaign promises of bringing about hope and change - an economy that is pulling out of the recession, the ending of the Iraq war, a doubling of Pell grants for college students, health care reform, the end of discrimination against gays in the military and more.
"We've had 23 consecutive months of job growth, so we are moving in the right direction, but it's going to take time," Jarrett said.
Republicans said the Obama officials were not telling the whole story.
"President Obama's policies of spend, spend and spend some more is putting future generations at serious risk," said Scott Laster, state GOP executive director. "As a father, I don't want my children to grow up owing tens of thousands of dollars to a foreign lender simply because President Obama spent their future away."
The speaker who received the most enthusiastic greeting was actress Gabrielle Union, who moderated the discussion and was the subject of most of the photographs being taken by smartphones. Union has appeared in a number of movies and television roles, including "Bad Boys II" with Will Smith, several Tyler Perry productions, and TV shows such as "Night Stalker" and "Ugly Betty."
She emphasized that Obama is someone who, like many of them, was raised by asingle mother and a grandmother, and who rose to where he is without the advantages enjoyed by former President George W. Bush.
"We have a president who wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth," Union said.
