Incumbent US President, Barack Obama made a last ditched effort in Florida on Sunday to rake in the votes despite a small protest staged by a dozen Republican supporters outside the McArthur High School where the rally was held.
Addressing a crowd of 23,000 US President Barack Obama appealed for them to vote him back into office based on what he describes as his record of keeping his promise.
“I said, I’d pass health care reform, I passed it. I said I’d repeal don’t ask don’t tell; I repealed it. I said we’d make sure the auto industry came back strong, it’s come back strong,” the US President said.
“You know what I believe, you know what I’m saying and you know that no matter what happens, I’ll fight for you and your families every single day I’m in office,” said President Obama.
The President, playing on the theme “change” which was this year adopted from his 2008 campaign by the Republican party projected himself as the true change, as he urged supporters to go out and encourage their friends and neighbours to vote him back into office.
“So when we’re trying to compare the two candidate’s agendas and we’re talking about change, you know that I know what real change looks like, because I fought for it; because I brought it; because I’ve got the scars to prove it; because I got grey hair doing it,” the US president quipped.
The rally which was held on the football field of the McArthur High School is the last big event in Florida, for the Democratic Party, ahead of Tuesday’s elections.
It followed the official close of the Early Voting polls in the state which saw a record 4.3 million people voting – 43% of Democrats and 40% Republicans.
Meanwhile there was still voting taking place at the Elections Department in Miami Dade, Florida on Sunday afternoon and on Monday despite the fact that the Early Voting Polls were officially closed on Saturday. This is primarily for persons voting using absentee ballots.
There have been a number of problems with mail-in ballots in the state of Florida, where persons requesting ballots by mail have said they have not received them and the Electoral Offices in the state have reported receiving a large quantity of returned ballots that the postal system were unable to deliver.
The Huffington Post says about 30 million people have already voted either by mail or in person in 34 states and in the District of Columbia.
No votes will be counted until Tuesday but some key states have released the party affiliation of early voters.©
