The Road To The White House: The Primaries

Steve Kroft Looks Back At Obama's Iowa Victory And The Tough Campaign Ahead

(CBS)  In Ohio, the issues were trade agreements and jobs. But in Chillicothe, people told 60 Minutes that both race and gender would be hidden factors in southern Ohio - that many blue collar workers here wouldn't vote for a woman, and others would never vote for a black. And Senator Obama had another problem: a malicious campaign against him, that surfaced in a number of the 60 Minutes interviews.

Asked who he was going to vote for, one man told Kroft, "I'm leaning towards Obama. There are a couple issues I'm not too clear on. …I'm hearin' he doesn't even know the National Anthem, you know. He wouldn't use the Holy Bible. He's got his own beliefs, got the Muslim beliefs. And couple issues that bothers me at heart."

"You know that's not true," Kroft said.

"No. I'm just… this is what I've been told," the man replied.

"One of the things that we found in southern Ohio, not widespread, but something that popped up on our radar screen all the time, people talking about it this idea that you're a Muslim," Kroft told Obama.

"Right. Did you correct them, Steve?" Obama asked.

"I did correct them," Kroft said.

Asked where this is coming from, Obama said, "You know, this has been a systematic e-mail smear campaign that's been goin' on since actually very early in this campaign. Clearly it is a deliberate effort by some group or somebody to generate this rumor. I have never been a Muslim, am not a Muslim. These e-mails are obviously not just offensive to me - somebody who's a devout Christian, who's been goin' to the same church for the last 20 years - but it's also offensive to Muslims. Because it plays into, obviously, a certain fear-mongering there."

As primary day drew near, a photo of Obama in ceremonial African tribal dress during a visit to Kenya was featured prominently on the Internet and attributed to someone in the Clinton campaign, but Senator Clinton disavowed any knowledge of it.

She told 60 Minutes she didn't believe Obama was a Muslim. "I mean, you know, there is no basis for that. I take him on the basis of what he says. And, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that," Senator Clinton said.

"You said you take Senator Obama at his word he Muslim, you don’t believe that?" Kroft continued. "No, no," Senator Clinton replied, "Why should I? There's nothing to base that on, as far as I know."

"It’s just scurrilous?" Kroft asked.

Clinton responded, "Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors, that I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time."