Nader campaign plans 10-state swing

11.30am

WASHINGTON - Condemned by Democrats and begged by former supporters to pull out of the race, independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader said he plans a 10-state campaign swing before Election Day.

"We're trying to get as many votes as possible, which means we're going into states that are characterised as safe states, battleground states and states that fall in between," Nader said at a Washington news conference.

He said that includes states like New York and his home state of Connecticut, where Democratic contender Massachusetts Senator John Kerry is favoured, as well as Louisiana and Alabama, where polls show Republican President George W Bush ahead.

Nader said his campaign will also go to prime swing states Pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa, as well as New Jersey, a usually Democratic state where the race has tightened, before November 2.

Democrats maintain that Nader's entry in the 2004 race takes votes away from Kerry and favours Bush. They warn of a repeat of 2000, when many Democrats blamed Nader, then the Green Party candidate, for taking enough votes from Democratic contender Al Gore to help Bush win the White House.

And after Election Day, Nader said, "the political movement of reform continues." In more than an hour with reporters, he said nothing about winning, because that is not the essential aim of his White House bid.

"Our long-range goal is to break up the two parties," Nader said. "(The two-party system) is a menace and subversion of our democratic processes and it's basically sold our elections and our government to commercial interests."

A Reuters/Zogby tracking poll on Monday showed Bush and Kerry deadlocked at 45 per cent each, and Nader at 1 per cent.

However, over the course of the election year, a different picture of Nader's impact emerges, the Zogby International polling firm found, with Nader pulling more votes from Kerry than from Bush.

Looking at data from March to September, Zogby found as many as 3 per cent of likely voters supported Nader. Without Nader in the mix, that 3 per cent was split four ways, with 41 per cent going to Kerry, 15 per cent Bush, 30 per cent to other candidates and 13 undecided. The margin of error for this long-term data was 5.7 per cent.

Nader's campaign is focused on the more than 30 states where his name is solidly on the ballot, unclouded by court challenges.

His trip to Pennsylvania is a foray into somewhat hostile territory, since Nader's name was removed from ballots there when petitions supporting his candidacy were questioned. The campaign is appealing this ruling, and is in court over ballot issues in Michigan, Texas, Oregon, Ohio, Illinois, Idaho and Hawaii.

One anti-Nader web site, The Unity Campaign, which bills itself as representing progressives of every political stripe, including many who publicly supported Nader in 2000, is seeking donations to run ads in alternative weekly publications in 11 swing states, trying to appeal to Nader voters.

"If you live in a swing state ... and love Nader? Vote strategically ... vote Kerry!" the proposed ad reads on the group's website.

Even if the Democrats address some of the pressing issues of the Nader campaign -- raising the minimum wage, withdrawing form Iraq -- in the coming days, Nader said he would not consider withdrawing.

"No, of course not," he replied to a direct question about whether he would withdraw. "This is not a convenient campaign."

- REUTERS