Reporting from Fairfax, Va., and Washington— As President Obama tore into another campaign-ready speech on gas prices in Maryland this week, the real work of his reelection campaign was happening across the state line, far from the spotlight ...

Eight months from election day, while Republican presidential contenders still battle in a protracted fight for their party's nomination, the Obama campaign is up and running — determined to make the most of its head start by reactivating the much-vaunted organization that prevailed in 2008.

The campaign has spent months and tens of millions of dollars building an on-the-ground and cyberspace organization earlier and larger than any previous presidential campaign. By January it already had a payroll to rival a professional baseball team, albeit a small-market one. The Obama effort has staff in every state. Its tentacles, which reach into red territory such as Wyoming, are all over the key battlegrounds. It has 15 field offices in Florida and 10 each in Ohio and Pennsylvania. A cavernous Chicago headquarters — 50,000 square feet in a high-rise overlooking the city skyline — is the hub.

In Virginia, a swing state that both sides believe could be key to the election, the Fairfax office is one of five statewide. Two more offices are slated to open next week. The campaign already has held 7,500 events in the state since April, including house parties and phone banks, like the "Women for Obama" event Thursday night. It has reached out to more than 450,000 Virginia voters on phones and at doors, according to the campaign.