PRESIDENT BUSH heads into Wednesday night’s final debate with John Kerry facing accusations that he was wired to receive help during their first prime-time encounter.

A bulge in the back of Mr Bush’s jacket during the first televised debate in Florida triggered a frenzy of rumours and accusations on the internet yesterday, the attention of several newspapers, and White House denials that he was wearing a radio transmitter.

As the latest polls revealed the US election on a knife-edge, with the two rivals tied just 23 days before polling day, Mr Bush’s aides were exasperated over the publication of photographs that appeared to show a small, box shape between the President’s shoulder blades.

Pressed for a serious answer as to whether Mr Bush was being fed answers by his chief political strategist, Karl Rove — a favourite target of liberal conspiracists — flatly denied any impropriety. Campaign aides said that Mr Bush was wearing nothing under his jacket — not a wire, not a transmitter, not a protective vest — saying it was merely a “wrinkle” in the jacket.

Mr Bush’s tailor, George de Paris, was even called on to dismiss the rumours. He said that the bulge was nothing more than a pucker along the jacket’s back seam.

Scott Stanzel, Mr Bush’s campaign manager, said: “It’s ridiculous. Some people have been spending too many hours looking at left-wing websites.” Despite the denials, however, speculation persisted that the bulge must have been caused by something.

The two men spent the weekend tearing into each other’s records with a new ferocity, after both camps took enough from Friday night’s second debate to claim victory.

In campaign stops in Ohio and Florida, Mr Kerry questioned Mr Bush’s maturity and temperament. Seizing on one moment during Friday’s debate, when Mr Bush advanced aggressively on the moderator and interrupted him, the Democrat challenger’s aides sought to portray the President as unhinged, issuing a three-page document describing him as “Nixon-like” and “hot under the collar”.

Although polls gave Mr Kerry the edge over Mr Bush after the debate in St Louis, Missouri, the President’s performance was far more solid and aggressive than his sometimes faltering appearance during their first encounter.

Buoyed by his performance, and the sense that he had stopped his slide in the polls, Mr Bush appeared in Missouri, Iowa and Minnesota with a new slogan to attack the Massachusetts senator.

Using a line he twice deployed during the debate, a reference to Mr Kerry’s 20-year Senate record, Mr Bush repeatedly declared: “He can run, but he can’t hide”. His audiences chanted the accusation along with him. According to a Reuters/Zogby poll released yesterday, Mr Kerry has a one-point lead over Mr Bush, by 46 to 45 per cent. A Time weekend poll had the rivals tied, on 45 per cent each. But on the critical issues of Iraq and terrorism, Mr Kerry still significantly lags behind the President, according to Gallup.

Wednesday night’s encounter will be the last prime-time chance for the two men to sway undecided voters. Weekend polls suggested that many swing voters in battleground states now view the last debate, which will focus on domestic issues, as critical to the choice they make.

In Florida Mr Kerry told a crowd that the most “stunning moment” of Friday’s debate came when Mr Bush was asked to name three mistakes that he has made. The President replied merely that he had “made some mistakes appointing people”.

Mr Kerry said: “The President couldn’t even name one mistake.” He added: “We need some adults running the foreign policy of the United States of America.”

Mr Bush mocked his opponent for his “right into the camera” pledge not to raise taxes on people earning less than $200,000 (£111,450) a year. “The problem is, to keep that promise, he would have to break all his other ones,” Mr Bush said to laughter.

WAS IT A SEAM

William Hunt, who owns a tailor’s shop in Savile Row where bespoke suits cost between £2,000 and £3,000, insisted that no suit or shirt would form such a strange ridge.

“Without a shadow of a doubt, I would say that he had some kind of wire running up his back underneath his clothing. Not even the seams on a cheap suit would look like that. It must have been some kind of transmitter.”

. . . OR SOMETHING ELSE?

If it is not a radio transmitter, feeding killer lines from the political adviser Karl Rove into an invisible earplug radio, what is President Bush’s back bulge? The possibilities are:

• A TENS machine
• An unusual hearing aid
• A back brace
• A security tag
• A bullet-proof vest
• A satellite tracking device

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