Politics | Barack Obama Obama Calls for Faith-Based Aid Expansion Patriotism tour continues with outreach to religious voters By Jonas Oransky Posted Jul 1, 2008 1:43 PM CDT Copied Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., center, talks to Rev. Bill Briggs, foreground, as he tours the East Community Ministry in Zanesville , Ohio, Tuesday, July 1, 2008. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong) Barack Obama today called for even more federal dollars for President Bush’s initiative funding faith-based social service groups, the AP reports. His plan will let the groups hire and fire based on religion, a controversial move that's part of an organized effort to court evangelical voters. The candidate says he wants to make the program a “moral center” of his presidency. “The challenges we face today ... are simply too big for government to solve alone,” the candidate said at a community center in Ohio. Discussing the plan, the ex-director of Bush’s faith-based initiative program invoked "much that was best in both then Vice President Al Gore's and then Texas Governor George W. Bush's respective first speeches on the subject in 1999." Read These Next Multiple people have been shot at a Mormon church in Michigan. North Carolina shooting suspect once walked the red carpet. The gunman who killed 4 at a Michigan church was an ex-marine. The latest mass shooting in the US took place from a boat. Report an error