Hillary Clinton made her first trip to Oregon, speaking to a packed high school gym just outside of Portland. While they acknowledge that her rival Barack Obama is favored here, the Clinton campaign is playing hard — naming a state director and what the campaign calls a “very active” steering committee, ramping up field staff and opening a state headquarters in Portland next week and satellite offices in every congressional district.

They’re also tailoring their strategy around Oregon’s unique mail-in primary system; ballots will be mailed out on April 28th, and the majority of voters are expected to submit ballots through the post.

“I’m here to meet with you and talk with you and hopefully make my case to you,” she told the voters of Hillsboro, OR. “This is my first trip in a campaign of firsts, and I’m glad to be able to blaze a home in the land of the Trailblazers.”

But even in the Beaver State, she was focused on Michigan and Florida. She’s long argued that their delegates should count, but today she claimed their popular votes should count as well — a move that would put her much closer to Obama in that metric.

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Tom Tancredo withdrew from the presidential race today and endorsed Governor Mitt Romney.  Around 10 am eastern at the Marriott in Des Moines, Romney met with Tancredo for about 30 minutes. The Tancredo campaign asked Romney for the meeting, but the Colorado congressman had not made up his mind whom to endorse before the meeting.

Romney released a statement after Tancredo’s endorsement:

“Congressman Tancredo ran a spirited campaign focused on issues that are important to many Americans. I thank him for his support. While we don’t agree on every issue, we agree on the need to keep America strong. I look forward to working with him and other Republicans to achieve that end.”

Tancredo campaigned on the issue of illegal immigration and he refused to participate in the recent Univision debate saying  his republican rivals were “pandering.”

Tancredo ran political ads linking illegal immigration to terrorist attacks, gang warfare, and even rape.