• ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) -- A strengthening Hurricane Sandy disrupted the campaign for the White House Monday, with President Obama canceling his political rallies and rushing back to the White House from battleground Florida to monitor the storm and get Air Force One safely back to Washington.
• Republican nominee Mitt Romney was campaigning in the Midwest out of the storm's path Monday, but called off events scheduled in Virginia Sunday and New Hampshire Tuesday.
• Obama, mindful of his need to show command in crisis while in the final throes of a tough re-election campaign, met with federal emergency officials Sunday before flying to Orlando Sunday evening ahead of a scheduled morning rally. But in the middle of the night he signed emergency declarations for several New England states and by dawn decided to call off the politicking.
• "Due to deteriorating weather conditions in the Washington area, the president will not attend today's campaign event in Orlando," spokesman Jay Carney said in a written statement. "The president will return to the White House to monitor the preparations for and early response to Hurricane Sandy."
• With eight days before Election Day, neither campaign could afford to fully shut down its political activity in a race that remains tight. Four critical election states are affected by the storm -- North Carolina, Virginia, Ohio and New Hampshire -- but there was still unthreatened ground to cover across the rest of the country.
• Romney was scheduled Monday to campaign in the perennial battlegrounds of Ohio and Iowa. He also was visiting Wisconsin, trying to force Obama to play defense in a state where the president has been leading in the polls despite the addition of native son Paul Ryan on the GOP ticket.
• "I know that right now some people in the country are a little nervous about a storm about to hit the coast, and our thoughts and prayers are with people who will find themselves in harm's way," Romney told supporters in Ohio on Sunday.

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