Obama sets first election rallies for early May

US: He has been spoiling for a fight for months but now it is official: US President Barack Obama will hold the first proper political rallies of his reelection bid in early May.

Obama, along with popular wife Michelle will throw down the gauntlet to Republican presumptive nominee Mitt Romney with two full-scale political events in the crucial battleground states of Ohio and Virginia.

"Welcome to the general election," Obama's campaign manager Jim Messina told reporters late Wednesday, launching a new, intense six-month sprint up to the day when Obama will ask voters for a second term on November 6.

The announcement came a day after Romney finally locked in his party nomination ahead of a general election campaign certain to focus on the uncertain US economic recovery after the worst recession since the 1930s.

The back-to-back rallies in Columbus, Ohio and Richmond, Virginia, will see Obama try to fire up the coalition of young, educated middle class, Hispanic and African American voters which swept him to power in 2008.

The Obama campaign portrays the president as a warrior for the middle classes who will fight for a economy where everyone -- not just the wealthy -- get a "fair shot." They also claim that Romney would return America to "back to the future" policies of tax cuts for the rich and lax regulation that caused the economic crisis in the first place. AFP