R. Leilani Baldevia was an Election Day volunteer in November 2006 for Gov. Linda Lingle, helping the Republican with her get-out-the-vote operation at Dole Cannery.

But Baldevia was behind a table yesterday morning at Kawananakoa Middle School, signing up volunteers to serve as district leaders and work the phone banks for Barack Obama's presidential campaign in the Hawai'i Democratic caucuses on Feb. 19.

"I'm one of those who switched," said Baldevia, who lives in 'Aiea and is the state coordinator of Students for Obama.

The U.S. senator from Illinois, who was born in Hawai'i and graduated from Punahou School, has moved dozens of volunteers in the Islands to get involved in politics this year.

The rally at Kawananakoa yesterday with Obama's sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, and U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawai'i, attracted some of the senator's old friends from Punahou, who passed around a yellowing class photo with Obama, and many young people who have never met him but say they have found a candidate who speaks to them.

"It's the charisma," said Baldevia, who said issues such as the slowing economy and access to healthcare are important to her. "He makes us feel good about the country. Obama has what it takes in order for us to change the course."

U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye, D-Hawai'i, and state Senate President Colleen Hanabusa, D-21st (Nanakuli, Makaha), have endorsed U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York for the Democratic nomination and Clinton is expected to have a strong base in Hawai'i. Many progressives in the party are also organizing behind U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, the only candidate to have visited the Islands during the campaign.

But the other campaigns cannot match Obama's local roots.

Volunteers yesterday had people sign blue Democratic Party of Hawai'i cards and helped register people to vote so they can participate in the caucuses next month. While the Democratic nomination seems to be building toward Feb. 5, when more than 20 states will vote, local Democrats still want to encourage turnout for the Hawai'i caucuses to help build the party.

"Barack Obama is the antidote to the political poison that's been created by George Bush and this administration," said Abercrombie, who left yesterday afternoon for a two-day campaign swing for Obama in Nevada. "He can change the atmosphere of politics in this country. And, what's more, he can grow the vote; that's what we need to have done."

Soetoro-Ng, speaking to reporters outside the rally, said Obama has no immediate plans to come back to Hawai'i but he may reassess his schedule after the Feb. 5 primary results.

"Hawai'i's support is important in so many ways," she said. "Symbolically, I think it's very important. This is his home state. We want to get people participating to a greater degree than they've ever participated before."

Soetoro-Ng, a history teacher at La Pietra Hawai'i School for Girls, said people of diverse backgrounds may be drawn to her brother because they see themselves in him. Obama's and Soetoro-Ng's mother was from Kansas. Obama's father is from Kenya, and the couple met as students at the University of Hawai'i-Manoa. Soetoro-Ng's father, from her mother's second marriage, was a student from Indonesia.

"I think that people also marvel at the complexity of our family," Soetoro-Ng said. "I think that complexity mirrors, to a great extent, the complexity of many families in this country and world today.

"I think that ends up being a point of real connection and inspiration."

Reach Derrick DePledge at ddepledge@honoluluadvertiser.com.