Romney predicts victory in Wis.

Associated Press

FITCHBURG, Wis.

Appearing ever-more confident in Wisconsin’s primary, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney focused entirely on Democratic President Barack Obama during a campaign trip through this upper Midwestern battleground and predicted a victory that could effectively seal the nomination for him Tuesday.

“We’re looking like we’re going to win this thing on Tuesday,” Romney told supporters, suggesting he also could claim wins in Maryland and the District of Columbia that day. “If I can get that boost also from Wisconsin, I think we’ll be on a path that’ll get me the nomination well before the convention.”

At the same time, fading rival Rick Santorum sought to stoke doubts about Romney’s conservative credentials on the last weekend of campaigning before the critical showdown. It’s Santorum’s last chance to prove his strength in the industrial heartland, where he’s said he can challenge Obama but where Romney has beaten him consistently.

Still, Romney nodded toward evangelical conservatives Saturday, acknowledging the doubts in the former Massachusetts governor that linger with these voters, and foreshadowing the balancing act that will face him in the months to come.

“President Obama believes in a government-centered society. He believes government guiding our lives will do a better job in doing so than individuals,” Romney told more than 1,000 Wisconsin conservatives at a Faith and Freedom Coalition meeting in the heart of GOP-heavy Waukesha County.

Romney, tagged by opponents as rich and detached, appealed to the spectrum of households he will need in the fall should he remain on the likely course to the GOP nomination. He mentioned a single mother he met Friday in Appleton, Wis., a landscaper from St. Louis and a Cambodian immigrant from Texas, all while blaming Obama for “the most tepid, weakest recovery we’ve seen since Hoover.”