Mitt Romney, in Colorado, looks to energize flagging campaign

Mitt Romney's campaign needs some good news.

The former Massachusetts governor returned home Tuesday from an overseas trip marred by several missteps and to the news that he appears to have lost ground in several key swing states, including Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania.

Taken as a whole, July was not Mr. Romney's month – and Romney may be thankful that it's a season when few Americans focus on the news.

But August is a new month and offers Romney several chances to energize his campaign. Sometime in the coming days or weeks, he'll announce his vice presidential pick, and he'll close the month with the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla.

Romney is starting the month, however, in another swing state: Colorado.

On Thursday, he'll head first to the Denver suburbs, speaking at the Jeffco Fairgrounds in Golden, Colo., before heading west to more rural voters in Basalt, Colo.

The visit to suburban Denver "will be a new opening, a new direction" for Romney, says Floyd Ciruli, a Denver-based pollster, noting that until now Romney has focused his Colorado campaigning in the more conservative parts of the state, hoping to shore up support and energize his base.

The Denver suburbs in Jefferson and Arapahoe counties – which have been trending moderately Democratic in recent years – are where the swing voters live.

"That's where the battleground is," says Mr. Ciruli.

Colorado went for Barack Obama in 2008 by nine percentage points. Though it was considered solidly Republican before that, Colorado has been trending more liberal for years, and now has a Democratic governor and Democratic-controlled Senate. This year, the race is likely to be much closer, but Colorado seems to be trending slightly toward Mr. Obama. Though it has just nine electoral votes, it's a state that both Obama and Romney would like to win.

1 | 2

Next