Almanac: At the Capitol

The first person in line outside Landmark Center is Rep. Dennis Ozment, the highly respected moderate Republican from Rosemount who is retiring from the legislature. Interesting to see a guy like Ozment showing his support for McCain, who made his name as a maverick moderate but is now being questioned for moving to the right. The other lawmaker in line is Rep. Steve Smith, another well-liked moderate from Mound. They said they weren't part of the undecided voters but rather a small group of supporters also invited.

Meanwhile, inside the undecided voters are starting to make their way inside the St. Paul venue. So far most of them appear to be middle-aged white people. The one person of color in the crowd was sitting on the wings and they just moved her into a more prominent position closer to McCain and in the camera's direction.

Here's the official word from McCain's campaign on who's in the crowd:

There are two groups of people in the audience tonight. The main group will be described below, and will be participating in Q&A with John McCain. Along the wings, there are a group of supporters, who are viewing the event but not participating in the town hall.

The main audience:

Using traditional media and polling protocol, the McCain campaign worked with the independent firm Direct Response Group, a telephone marketing firm, to identify “undecided” Minnesota voters:

• We used a phone bank to identify non-partisan voters - those who don't call themselves strong Republican or strong Democrat.
• Those who were not strong partisans (lean towards a party or call themselves Independent) were then asked how they will vote.
• If they “leaned” towards a political party AND “leaned” towards either candidate, they were included in the sample audience.
• Those who had not made a decision whatsoever or were not affiliated with a party were included and were our top priority.

Rather than giving lofty speeches to the converted behind a teleprompter, the McCain campaign will continue to participate in this town hall format in an effort to speak to undecided voters and raise the level of dialogue in this campaign. John McCain believes it is essential that we are able to talk about the issues with voters, and Barack Obama said he agreed, claiming to be willing to meet at “anytime, any place” but as of yet, he has not taken us up on our offer to meet tonight in Minnesota. Nor has he followed through on our offer to hold 10 joint town halls with undecided voters. We await follow-thru, but in the meantime, look forward to the opportunity to talk with Minnesota voters this evening.