Obama thanks women of Illinois delegation for his political start

Sara Burnettand Nancy Mitchell, Rocky Mountain News

Published August 29, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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Photo by Alex Brandon / Associated Press

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama shakes hands as he makes a surprise visit to the Illinois delegation women's luncheon on Thursday in a downtown Denver hotel.

Photo by Joe Mahoney/The Rocky

Michelle Obama waves from the crowd at Invesco Field on Thursday. Earlier, she spoke to delegates attending the women's caucus.

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Sen. Barack Obama, hours away from accepting his party's nomination at Invesco Field, paid a surprise visit to the women of the Illinois delegation.

"I have a speech tonight. I wanted to practice it out on you guys," Obama joked as the women gathered at the Denver Marriott City Center cheered. "See if it works."

Dressed in a gray suit and blue tie, Illinois' junior senator spoke for about two minutes, thanking the women for helping get his political career started.

He told the crowd it was "like going back on memory lane" as he pointed out friends who worked on his previous campaigns, including runs for state Senate, a failed congressional bid and his 2004 Senate race.

"I have not forgotten where I came from," Obama said. "I haven't forgotten who got me here. It's because of all of you.

"It's because of all of you that Michelle and I have this great honor of helping to lead this party and take back this White House. Everything I do I do because of what I've learned from you, because of the support you've given me."

As he spoke, one woman yelled out: "I love you!"

Delores Register, of Oak Park, Ill., called it "very emotional" and "very meaningful."

"Here we were eating lunch, and it was like the clouds parted and the sun was shining in," she said.

Earlier in the day, Obama played basketball at the Denver Athletic Club.

He slipped in a side door around 8:15 a.m. with his personal aide, Reggie Love, and adviser Dr. Eric Whitaker. They played for about an hour.

At another gathering Thursday, Michelle Obama tapped into her husband's story - raised by a single mom who sometimes had to rely on food stamps - to tell delegates attending a women's caucus that her husband knows their struggles and needs their support.

"The struggles of working women and families . . . aren't new to any of us," she said as hundreds of delegates and supporters cheered in acknowledgment, "and they're certainly not new to Barack."

His mom had to use "food stamps to keep it all together" while raising him, Michelle Obama said, and then struggled with medical bills as she fought cancer later in life.

"As president, Barack will change Washington," she said. "So instead of talking about family values, we will have policies valuing families."

She said her husband will expand the family medical leave act and provide at least seven paid sick days a year for workers, a boon for moms who often have to take time off for their sick children.

He will ensure women are paid fairly for their hard work - "closing the pay gap" - and protect a woman's right to choose, she added.

"It's a family issue," she said of that pay gap. "When women are paid less for their work, who pays the price? Their children."

Michelle Obama also paid homage to Hillary Clinton, her husband's former rival, by saying Clinton made him "a better candidate." She also said Clinton helped her own two daughters see what's possible for women in America.

A few women walked around carrying yellow "Hillary" signs but did not disrupt the event.

Michelle Obama implored women to work as hard for her husband as they had for Hillary.

"We're going to need you every step of the way," she said. "I'm going to need you every step of the way."

Before Michelle Obama spoke, four anti-abortion protesters quietly made their way to the front of the ballroom, stood up facing the audience and whipped off coats to show T-shirts proclaiming their stance. They began to shout but were quickly drowned out by cries of "O-ba-ma! O-ba-ma!" from audience members.

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