Irish American voters are a key demographic in the race to decide who becomes president next week, and in the final days of the election campaign Irish American supporters of both parties are working tirelessly to elect their respective candidates.

The Irish Voice spoke to Irish American groups supporting both candidates in battleground states to get their take on how the respective campaigns are playing out on the ground.

In Pittsburgh, Jim Lamb, who is head of the Irish Institute there and an Irish for Obama campaign organizer, told the Irish Voice, "Pittsburgh is historically a Democratic city - our City Council is all Democrats - so people from Irish backgrounds here are more in support of Obama than McCain.

"I'm coordinating the Pittsburgh Irish for Obama group here and since the convention we've worked closely with Stella O'Leary, the national chair of the Irish American Democrats and Carol Wheeler, Obama's liaison to the Irish community."

Lamb noted that there was a great diversity of opinion within the Irish community in Pittsburgh about the most pressing issues facing Irish American voters there, saying that some were encouraged by the recent letter from Obama to the AOH and the Irish American Unity Conference. In the letter Obama addressed the issues of immigration, appointing a special envoy to Northern Ireland and other topical concerns.

"There are other Irish American voters here who are more concerned about the economy, the war in Iraq and the other issues that most Americans take an interest in," Lamb added. "It's clear to us already that they're trending strongly toward Obama."

As if to illustrate the unpredictable nature of the 2008 race, in Omaha, Nebraska, a state which hasn't voted for a Democratic candidate for president since 1964, the normally safe Republican state is in play this year, with a real chance that it may turn blue for the first time in decades.

Local attorney Jim Cavanaugh, who heads the Irish for Obama in the state told the Irish Voice, "Omaha is basically a city state and it controls its own electoral vote, and the Obama campaign has invested a lot of resources here from the start. The state is about 30 percent Irish and 45 percent Catholic, and we're doing comprehensive canvassing, get-out-the-vote, voter compliance and grass roots volunteering that's bigger than anything I've ever seen here and I've been in politics for 50 years."

The reason for the dramatic turnaround in Democratic fortunes is plain, Cavanaugh says.

"A comprehensive record of incompetence and failure over the last eight years is to blame. There's not an aspect of foreign or domestic policy that you can point to and say we're not worse off. This election will be about the middle class of America speaking up," he says.

Jeff Cleary, the national chair of the Irish American Republicans group, was in the battleground state of Ohio on Tuesday, where he was concentrating on his team's efforts on ensuring the integrity of the vote.

"We're going through precinct lists and putting inspectors in place aided by roving legal teams. If there are five places to vote here we'll have a McCain observer in each one of them. On election day they'll check the issues that arise, or challenge them, as the case may be," says Cleary.

Checking in at the local Irish bars in the city, it was Cleary's assessment that Irish American voters there were trending toward McCain in what he called a heavily Democratic city. "We at the Irish American Republicans group have people deployed in Cleveland and Philadelphia, but we have members in Maine, New Hampshire, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Florida," said Cleary.

"We're feeling very confident about Florida. The Irish American Republicans have done a great job of recruiting there. Nationally the public polls are all over the place and frankly very unreliable.

"McCain's internal polls show the election is very close. If I was (Irish bookmaker) Paddy Power I would be regretting his decision to pay out over an Obama win."