Barack Obama staked an ambitious claim to new political turf after choosing Virginia and North Carolina as his first two stops of the White House campaign.
Pushing deep into Republican territory, Mr Obama took aim at two states that have spurned Democratic presidential candidates for more than three decades. The moves signalled his intent to compete on a wider playing field than the party's recent nominees.
The candidate also has targeted Western states like Colorado and Nevada, chipping away at a political map that has limited Democratic opportunities in the last two races to gain the 270 electoral votes needed to capture the White House.
"It was a bold statement to start down here. But Democrats have thought they had a chance to put Virginia or North Carolina in play before," said Andrew Taylor, a political scientist at North Carolina State University.
In 2004, Democratic nominee John Kerry had early hopes in the region and even picked a North Carolina senator, John Edwards, as his running mate - and still lost the state to President George W. Bush by 12 percentage points.
Mr Obama, an Illinois senator who would be the first black US president, clinched the Democratic presidential nomination last week and will face Republican John McCain in November's election.
He hopes a surge in Democratic voter registration and record turnout among young and black voters can help break down some of the partisan boundaries that have hemmed in the party's recent nominees.
But Mr McCain also aims to change the map, hoping his appeal to independents and Mr Obama's difficulties with white working-class voters give him a shot in blue-collar battlegrounds recently won by Democrats like Michigan and Pennsylvania.