HELENA, Mont., May 20 (UPI) -- Sen. Barack Obama's grass-roots strategy attracts American Indian voters for the June 3 presidential contests in Montana and South Dakota, representatives say.
Obama, D-Ill., dispatched his top campaign officials to put the focus in those states on American Indians, who are often overlooked in national political contests, The Wall Street Journal said Tuesday.
"I often talk about how the needs of Americans are going unmet in Washington. Well, few have been ignored in Washington as much as the Native Americans, the first Americans," Obama said.
Obama told a crowd of supporters in Montana he would advocate stronger ties between tribal governments and the White House and push for stronger healthcare on reservations.
Voter turnout among American Indians is typically low but that could cater to Obama's strategy of grass-roots campaigning.
"The sense of energy and of really being engaged at the grass-roots level really does resonate with people who are so dislocated from the (urban) hubs," Patrice Kunesh, director of the Institute of American Indian Studies at the University of South Dakota, told the Journal.
