Obama to make 11th-hour Bridgeport visit for Malloy

President Barack Obama shakes hands with Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy before speaking at Kaiser Hall Gymnasium on the campus of Central Connecticut State University in New Britain, Conn. Wednesday, March 5, 2014.  President Obama discussed his support to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 and was joined by Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin, Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy.

President Barack Obama shakes hands with Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy before speaking at Kaiser Hall Gymnasium on the campus of Central Connecticut State University in New Britain, Conn. Wednesday, March 5, 2014. President Obama discussed his support to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 and was joined by Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin, Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy is bringing the closer: President Barack Obama.

Forced to scrap an Oct. 15 campaign appearance with Malloy in Bridgeport because of the public health threat of the Ebola virus, Obama has rescheduled his visit to Connecticut’s most populous city for Nov. 2 — the Sunday before Election Day.

The state Democratic Party announced the makeup date on Tuesday, but did not release any further details about the president’s itinerary or the venue for the rally.

“He has told us that he’s coming back,” Malloy told reporters Tuesday morning in Hartford. “The closer the better. He would have been here last week, but there was an emergency, and I certainly understood that. We’ll bring him to a community, probably back to Bridgeport, if he’s willing, where we absolutely want to drive voter turnout.”

There is talk that Democrats are scouting out a larger venue for the rally.

Obama had been scheduled to stump for Malloy at Bridgeport’s Central High School before postponing his mid-week political trip to the Northeast, which was supposed to take him from New Jersey to Connecticut. The school’s gymnasium holds 2,000 people.

Malloy captured 81 percent of the vote in Bridgeport four years ago, with Obama traveling to the city in the final throes of the 2010 campaign to support the Democratic ticket.

Obama’s approval rating in Connecticut was 48 percent in a May Quinnipiac poll, the most recent snapshot of his favorability here.

This will be Obama’s second visit to Connecticut in less than a month. On Oct. 7, the president headlined a VIP dinner in Greenwich for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, with some guests paying up to $32,400 to rub elbows with the president.

Malloy did not attend that fundraiser. His campaign had been working for several weeks to bring Obama to the state to campaign for Malloy, who is facing 2010 Republican opponent Tom Foley in a hotly-contested rematch.

Neil Vigdor