Howard Wilkinson

First Lady Michelle Obama will rally the troops at the Duke Energy Convention Center on Tuesday, the first day of early voting in Ohio.

According to a campaign press release, the First Lady will "speak about what's at stake in this election for Ohioans, encourage them to organize their communities between now and November, and promote voter registration and voting through GottaVote.com."

The event is free and open to the public, but a ticket is required.

After his first debate with Republican Mitt Romney Wednesday night, President Obama will head back to the key battleground state of Ohio on Thursday and Friday.

Obama will hold an event in Denver Thursday morning; and then travel to Columbus for a what the campaign calls a "grassroots event" in Columbus. On Friday, the campaign said, another "grassroots" event will take place in Cleveland.

The Obama-Biden campaign has yet to release details on the president's Columbus and Cleveland events.

There are signs that the early voting which begins in Ohio Tuesday is going to be even bigger this year than it was in the last presidential election four years ago.

Registered voters in Ohio will be able to vote in person at their county boards of elections beginning Tuesday morning, but many more are expected to vote absentee by mail.

As of Thursday, the Hamilton County Board of Elections had already received absentee ballot applications from 61,263 voters.

“They’ve been pouring in,’’ said Amy Searcy, director of the Hamilton County Board of Elections.

A new poll shows President Obama holding large leads over Republican challenger Mitt Romney in three key battleground states - Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania.

The Quinnipiac University/CBS News/New York Times poll released Wednesday has Obama up by 10 percentage points in Ohio - 53 percent to 43 percent for Romney.

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, locked in a tough race for re-election, will rally with union workers and Democratic supporters Wednesday afternoon to draw attention to his role in the 2009 auto industry bailout, which he says saved 850,00 Ohio jobs.

The rally is at 4 p.m. Wednesday at the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers union hall at 1100 Crawford St. in Middletown.

Brown's campaign chose Middletown for the rally because AK Steel, located in that Butler County city, produces some of the steel for the Chevy Cruze, an Ohio-built auto.