Candidates for governor and the U.S. Senate hopscotched around the state Friday, rallying their parties' supporters and urging them to vote as election day draws near.

In the governor's race, Republican Meg Whitman swept through the Central Valley seeking to motivate the region's rich trove of Republican voters — and getting inadvertent help from former Gov. Gray Davis, a Democrat.

Davis had told the Sacramento Bee on Thursday that the next governor would be forced to ask voters to renew temporary tax hikes they approved last year to help balance the budget. Whitman used his comments to bolster her contention that her Democratic rival, state Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown, a former governor himself, would raise taxes.