By Cindi Andrews
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry answers questions Wednesday at UAW Union Local 696 in Dayton during a campaign stop. Sen. John Edwards arrives in the state Saturday for two days to stump for votes in the March 2 Ohio primary. The Cincinnati Enquirer/GLENN HARTONG

DAYTON - Ohio's moment in the presidential spotlight has arrived.

Sens. John Kerry and John Edwards, the last two Democratic candidates with any chance left of winning their party's nomination, turned their attention Wednesday to the Buckeye State.

Ohio's primary is March 2.

Front-runner Kerry beat the quickest path here, with appearances in Dayton and Columbus on Wednesday, less than 24 hours after a victory in Wisconsin.

Edwards, whose hopes were buoyed by a closer-than-expected finish in Wisconsin, arrives Saturday for two days of campaigning.

President Bush's surrogates are also swooping into Ohio - if only by conference call - to shore up his support on the heels of a new Ohio Poll that shows his approval rating below 50 percent for the first time.

The campaign intensity underscores Ohio's critical role in presidential elections. No Republican has won the White House without winning Ohio.

All three campaigns focused Wednesday on the economy, which voters have said is uppermost in their minds.

"This is the heartland," Kerry told about 250 working and laid-off factory employees at a town hall-style meeting in Dayton. "The heart has been ripped out of the heartland by an economic policy that doesn't remain connected to real lives of real people."

Ohio has lost 264,700 jobs since Bush took office, the Kerry campaign says, 160,100 of them in manufacturing

Vicki Johnson, a single mother from Englewood, told the Massachusetts senator about her fears for her job at Delphi Corp., an auto-parts maker that has laid off thousands of workers nationally in recent years.

"They keep telling me about this economic recovery, and I keep looking around and thinking, 'Where is it at?' " she told Kerry.

After the event, she said she would vote for Kerry because he has a plan to save jobs.

At an evening union rally with more than 500 workers in Columbus, Kerry said the one person who deserves to be laid off is Bush.

Kerry touted former President Clinton's record several times, noting that Democrats under Clinton's leadership reduced the national debt, created 23 million jobs and balanced the budget.

He criticized corporations that take jobs and business overseas. If elected, he promised, he would strip away every tax reward for a "Benedict Arnold CEO" to take American jobs to other countries.

He also joked with some workers in the crowd, reading aloud a sign that said, "Vote the son of Bush out."

He laughed and said, "Like father, like son, one term and you're done."

Bush supporters say a key element of Kerry's plan - ending tax cuts for people who make more than $200,000 a year - would hurt the economy.

"Two-thirds of those are small-business owners or investors," said Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee. "Small businesses have always paved the way for job creation in our economy, and they always will."

Small businesses account for half of all jobs in Ohio, Gillespie told the national and regional news media in a conference call meant to take some of the air out of Kerry's visit.

Bush won Ohio by four percentage points in 2000. He has assembled another formidable organization to capture the state's 20 electoral votes.

But the latest Ohio Poll, conducted Jan. 30-Feb. 10, found that Ohioans' ratings of Bush's handling of foreign affairs and the economy are the lowest of his presidency.

The poll found that 49 percent approve and 49 percent disapprove of the job Bush is doing. The remaining 2 percent are noncommittal. Just 40 percent approve of Bush's handling of the economy.

The poll was based on interviews with 842 adults across Ohio and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points. The poll was conducted by the Institute for Policy Research at the University of Cincinnati.

"I do think we are seeing some concern in Ohio about the economy," acknowledged Rep. Rob Portman, the Bush campaign's communications director in Ohio. But Portman said both the economy and Americans' perception of it are improving.

Kerry is far ahead of Edwards, with 15 primary and caucus wins to one for Edwards.

But Edwards plans a five-state campaign swing in Ohio, New York, Georgia, Maryland and Minnesota in advance of the March 2 primaries in 10 states, when 1,151 delegates are at stake.

The Edwards campaign has an office in Cleveland and plans to open several more in the state in coming days, spokesman Patrick Dillon said.

"Ohio is an important state for this campaign, and jobs and the economy will be our main message," Dillon said. "This is not just something he has picked up to get votes; this is what his campaign is about."

Edwards plans campaign stops in Cleveland, Columbus and Youngstown this weekend.

The two Democrats will be trying to win over voters like Bob Fortner, a Korean War veteran and retired union worker at the Columbus rally for Kerry. He isn't sure if he will vote for Kerry or Edwards.

"(Kerry's) military record doesn't mean much," he said. "I want to see what he can do for the country, and the working people."

Keith Goudy, a Vietnam veteran, also hadn't made up his mind. Wearing fatigues and a button with the words "We weren't soldiers" over a photo of Bush and Vice President Cheney, he said, "I don't like anybody making decisions about war when they've never experienced it."

Still, Goudy said, he is less concerned about Kerry's military record than "whether I'll have health care next year."

Reporter Debra Jasper contributed.

E-mail candrews@enquirer.com