Late jab has Mitt in control

MITT Romney’s late charge has wiped out President Barack Obama’s polling lead.

It has left the White House rivals i n the tightest of races, raising the stakes of their second debate today.

The Republican presidential challenger has built momentum since winning the pair’s first showdown two weeks ago and Mr Obama’s electoral firewall — his grip on several key swing states — appears to have been weakened if not yet been breached.

Both the Democrat and the Republican were locked away yesterday in intense preparation for their clash at Hofstra University, New York, with Mr Obama needing a comeback punch after a listless showing in their debut encounter.

Polls show Mr Obama and Mr Romney mostly matched within the margin-of-error, ahead of the November 6 election, with the Republican profiting from a dominant performance two weeks ago and foreign policy missteps by his opponent.

Mr Obama’s team insists it still has multiple routes toward the magic number of 270 votes needed to win the White House in the state-bystate system known as the Electoral College.

But the momentum remains with Mr Romney’s team and another Republican debate victory — or a strong comeback from Mr Obama — would further shift the underlying dynamics of the race.

Yesterday, Mr Obama compounded impressions that he was facing a knife-edge election, with a fundraising email reading: ‘‘ This race is tied.’’

But his spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, insisted that, although the campaign had believed all along that his re-election bid would be tight, the President still enjoyed fundamental advantages.

‘‘It is very, very close, there are some states where we are up by two points, there are some states where we are down two points,’’ she said, as Mr Obama sequestered himself for a third day of debate practice.