LORDSTOWN, Ohio — Republican John McCain yesterday told Ohio autoworkers in an economically depressed area that he supports free-trade agreements that many of them feel cost jobs. He also said he backed government investment to help produce the electric cars of the future.

His confession and commitment followed a tour of a General Motors Corp. factory that produces the gas-thrifty Chevrolet Cobalt.

GM has also announced plans to build in 2010 the Chevrolet Volt, a vehicle that will travel 40 miles by battery power but also have a seven-gallon gas tank, extending its range to 140 miles.

McCain praised both developments as he also made the pitch for an energy strategy that calls for producing more oil, developing a revolutionary automotive battery pack and conserving energy in the government's office buildings and federal auto fleet.

"We must develop vehicles such as are being developed here," McCain told employees attending a town-hall meeting. "We can lead again in the automotive industry and that can lead to thousands of jobs."

The Mahoning Valley is a Democratic stronghold that blames its economic woes on the kind of free-trade policies that McCain supports. The region lost 16,600 jobs from 2000 through 2007, almost all of them in the manufacturing sector.