US democrats to vote in Michigan, Washington

10.10am

DETROIT - Democratic front-runner John Kerry looked to build on his commanding lead in the race for the White House on Saturday as voters in Michigan and Washington state attended presidential nominating contests.

After wins in seven of the first nine contests, Kerry was riding a wave of momentum that threatens to swamp all five of his remaining rivals vying for the right to challenge President George W Bush in November.

A total of 204 delegates to July's nominating convention were at stake in the two states on Saturday. Kerry was favoured in both, moving out to a huge lead in public opinion polls in Michigan, the biggest state to vote so far.

Michigan and Washington are the first of five states to vote in the presidential race over the next four days. Maine will hold caucuses on Sunday, and Tennessee and Virginia will hold primaries on Tuesday.

Kerry, a senator from Massachusetts, campaigned in Tennessee and Virginia on Saturday, looking ahead to the showdowns with Southern rivals Wesley Clark and John Edwards there.

Michigan, a strongly Democratic state with a broad urban and rural mix and large populations of blacks and union members, had been pegged a key battleground in the nomination fight but Kerry's surge forced his rivals to recalculate their strategies.

Clark, a retired general, and John Edwards, a North Carolina senator, both skipped visits to either Michigan or Washington this week to focus on Tuesday's contests in Virginia and Tennessee, where they are locked in a tough battle that could decide which one moves on to tackle Kerry.

Former front-runner Howard Dean, who in a month has squandered big leads in the polls and a record bank account, made some appearances in Michigan and Washington but pulled out to concentrate on making a potential last stand in the February 17 primary in Wisconsin.

Dean took a day off the campaign trail to stay home in Burlington, Vermont, and attend his son's hockey game.

"We need to win in Wisconsin," Dean told NBC television. "I think I have a chance there."

Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator and decorated Vietnam War veteran, has campaigned in all five states up for grabs in the next few days as part of his strategy to compete everywhere.

His wins last Tuesday in Arizona, North Dakota, Delaware, Missouri and New Mexico ended questions about whether his appeal was limited to the primarily liberal and white electorates that gave him his first two wins in Iowa and New Hampshire.

But a win in either Virginia or Tennessee could answer questions about whether a son of Massachusetts can compete in the South.

"I'm not worried about coming down South and talking to people about jobs and schools and health care and the environment," Kerry told supporters at a rally at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee.

"I think it's them (the Bush administration) who ought to worry about coming down here and talking to people about the things that they haven't done," he said.

Kerry, whose candidacy was given up for dead a month ago, has seen his fortunes rise in the last month as voters have re-examined which of the candidates would be best suited to challenge Bush.

On the campaign trail, he has hammered away at his theme of driving the special interests out of the White House and providing a more experienced hand on foreign policy and national security.

Michigan and Washington, with 128 and 76 delegates at stake respectively, would be his two biggest wins.

The contests in both states will be caucuses, which differ from primaries in that they are typically the first step in a broader process of picking delegates. But they are unlike the Iowa caucuses, where participants gathered at community meeting spots at specific times to make their choices.

- REUTERS