ORLANDO, Florida, Oct 30 (AFP) - Osama bin Laden injected last-minute uncertainty into the US election campaign Saturday as his threat to the United States sparked an angry new debate between President George W. Bush and Democratic rival John Kerry.
Bush told top security officials to take all necessary steps to secure Tuesday's vote, while a furor between the candidates broke out over Kerry's response to the bin Laden tape. The two sides accused each other of seeking political gain from the Al-Qaeda leader's intervention in the campaign.
"The president did direct them to make sure we were taking all actions that might be necessary," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said after Bush spoke to his domestic security team.
National security adviser Condoleezza Rice was with the president in Grand Rapids, Michigan when Bush conducted a secure videolink conference with CIA Director Porter Goss, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI chief Robert Mueller.
Ridge said later that the nationwide terrorist alert level would not be raised despite the video.
The mastermind of the September 11, 2001, attacks shocked the United States with his warning that US voters will be held accountable for any leader who seeks to persecute Muslims.
"Your security is not in the hands of Kerry, Bush or Al-Qaeda. Your security is in your own hands. Any state which does not play havoc with our security would automatically ensure its own security," bin Laden said.
Without making a direct threat of new attacks, he said, "The reasons to repeat what happened remain."
Bush and Kerry gave tough responses, but the unity quickly gave way to bitter recriminations.
In a television interview, Kerry vowed to hunt down and kill terrorists, and said the United States was united in that desire.
Then, emphasizing one of his campaign themes, he said Bush should have snared bin Laden in Afghanistan in the 2001 war.
He renewed the attack on Saturday in Appleton, Wisconsin, one of the key swing states expected to decide the election.
"Let me make it clear to people all across the world: As Americans, we are all absolutely united, all of us. There are no Democrats, there are no Republicans," Kerry told a rally.
"As I have said for two years now, when Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda were cornered in the mountains of Tora Bora, it was wrong to outsource the job of capturing them to Afghan warlords who a week earlier were fighting against us," Kerry said.
Kerry said Bush should instead have used "the best-trained troops in the world, who wanted to avenge America for what happened in New York and Pennsylvania and in Washington" on September 11.
Bush called the charges "shameful."
"Unfortunately, my opponent tonight continued to say things he knows are not true, accusing our military of passing up a chance to get Osama bin Laden at Tora Bora," the president told supporters in Ohio late Friday.
Speaking to thousands of supporters in a sports arena in Wisconsin, Bush boiled the election down to one question, saying "the decision comes down to: Who do you trust?"
Kerry has "a position of weakness and inaction," said Bush, who has made his generalship of the war on terrorism his central re-election argument. "I offer leadership and results, in a time of threat and a time of challenge."
A day after accusing Kerry of politicizing the bin Laden tape, Bush did not mention the issue in his campaign speech here but did address it in interviews with local television stations, aides said. The White House refused to release the transcripts.
Bush aides argued that the Kerry line on terrorism was inappropriate in light of bin Laden's tape. White House communications director Dan Bartlett said Kerry should have suspended hostilities for 12 hours.
The two rivals kept up punishing schedules through the weekend as polls, taken before bin Laden burst into the campaign, showed there was still no decisive lead.
A Newsweek poll of 1,005 likely voters gave Bush a 50 percent to 44 percent lead over Kerry, with a four-percentage-point margin of error. A daily Zogby tracking poll on Saturday gave Kerry a 47 percent to 46 percent edge.
A Washington Post tracking poll had Bush ahead by just one percentage point -- 49 percent versus Kerry's 48 percent.
Both sides were also focusing new attention on Hawaii and Arkansas, with Vice President Dick Cheney visiting the Democratic stronghold of Hawaii following polls that showed it could swing.
Democrats sensed a similar surprise victory in Arkansas, which voted for Bush in 2000.

10/31/2004 02:24 GMT - AFP