US election 2012: Mitt Romney accused of 'Hail Mary' tactics He even asked his wife, Ann, to join him for his first appearance in three years on the weekly politics show, NBC's Meet the Press, where she defended his character, saying her husband had been "demonised" for his wealth and business success. Mr Romney had hoped to secure a lead over Mr Obama, who was campaigning in Florida yesterday, following the two party conventions, but the latest Gallup poll at the weekend showed the incumbent president leading the race by 49 per cent to 45 per cent, a five-point swing in the past two weeks. Mr Romney went into attack mode yesterday, straying from his central theme of the president's handling of the economy to religion, insisting that he would keep God at the heart of American society. "I will not take God off our coins and I will not take God out of my heart," he said, apparently suggesting that Democrats wanted to remove the phrase "In God We Trust" from US currency. "We're a nation that's bestowed by God," Mr Romney continued at a rally in the critical swing state of Virginia. He criticised the Democrats for an embarrassing episode at their convention in Charlotte, where their policy platform made no reference to God in any of its 70 pages. After an angry intervention by the White House, party officials hastily re-inserted some religious language. The Republican also accused Mr Obama of an "extraordinary miscalculation" that would weaken the military by agreeing to defence cuts of $55 billion dollars (£34 billion) next year if politicians cannot reach a spending deal. Critics have questioned how Mr Romney will achieve his pledge to balance the government's budget without making severe inroads into the $700 billion (£437 billion) the US spends on defence. A spokesman for the Obama campaign said Mr Romney was trying "to throw a Hail Mary by launching extreme and untrue attacks against the president."