U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., speaks to a group of Oregon National Guard troops Saturday during the Veterans Career and Benefits Fair in August on the Blue Mountain Community College campus in Pendleton. Staff photo by E.J. Harris of the East Oregonian

WASHINGTON (AP) – The Democratic wave wiped out Oregon Sen. Gordon Smith.

Smith, a two-term Republican who had earned a national reputation as a moderate, had said he hoped to “surf” the nationwide Democratic tide and win election to a third term.

But after two days of vote counting, the wave crashed over him.

Smith fell well behind Democrat Jeff Merkley, speaker of the Oregon House, and called Merkley Thursday to concede.

The defeat came despite a remarkable move to the political middle. Smith didn’t just run away from President Bush and John McCain. He practically leapt into the arms of Barack Obama and other Democrats.

His campaign ads touted his work with Obama as well as Massachusetts Sens. Ted Kennedy and John Kerry on issues such as alternative energy and hate crimes. Above all, Smith held tight to Democrat Ron Wyden, his fellow Oregon senator and longtime friend.

None of it worked. Smith fell victim to a year when the GOP brand – in Oregon and nationally – was in free fall. Smith’s seat was one of at least six that Democrats took away from Republicans as they tried to put together a filibuster-proof, 60-seat majority in the Senate.

Smith, 56, said he had no regrets about the campaign. “Simply, the national political tide was too high to overcome,” he said.

Smith has prided himself on reaching across the aisle to help create jobs, improve health care and bridge the nation’s rural-urban divide. He said Thursday that he “stood for a Republican Party with wide-open arms – hopeful, optimistic and tolerant.”

In a letter to supporters, Smith said he was most proud of his efforts to raise awareness of mental health issues and to stand for rural people and rural places who too often feel left behind.

A millionaire Mormon from rural eastern Oregon, Smith was considered the state’s most explicitly conservative senator in a half-century when he was elected in 1996.

In recent years, though, he increasingly positioned himself as a moderate – earning national attention for opposing President Bush on gay rights, Medicaid cuts, drilling in Alaska and, most notably, the war in Iraq.

He also forged a now-legendary partnership with Wyden, a relationship Smith said has achieved “accomplishments for an Oregon agenda that is a great credit to our state.”

He breezed to re-election six years ago but found his path to a third term blocked in part by Wyden, who appeared in a TV ad promoting Merkley and campaigned with his fellow Democrat around the state.

Wyden also asked Smith to take down a campaign commercial touting their longtime friendship and collaboration. In a sign of the campaign’s hard-fought nature, Smith refused.

On the campaign trail, Smith said he believed Oregon voters would again endorse his record of working cooperatively with Wyden and other Democrats. He also cited his seniority on key committees – including the tax-writing Senate Finance Committee – saying, “Oregon gives that up if they tell me to go home.”

Voters did not heed his plea.

Smith also stumbled, particularly when on the attack.

Last month, he apologized for a Republican ad that showed Merkley continuing to eat a hot dog while fumbling a question about Russia’s invasion of Georgia. The ad, which featured footage shot by a video tracker hired by Republicans, appeared to backfire after it was shown repeatedly for weeks.

A frozen-food magnate once better known for his expensive suits than his legislation, Smith emphasized his sharp criticism of the Iraq war, as well as efforts to increase mileage standards for cars and extend hate crimes protection to gay men and lesbians.

Normally reserved, Smith showed an emotional side in winning passage in 2004 of a suicide prevention law named after his son, Garrett, who killed himself a year earlier. Fellow senators were shaken as Smith tearfully described his failures as a father and his inability to reach Garrett.

Four years after voting to authorize the Iraq war, Smith made an emotional speech in 2006 denouncing it as “absurd” and maybe even “criminal.”

Democrats called Smith’s effort too little, too late. They called his emphasis on his bipartisan record – including opposition to Alaska oil drilling – misleading.

“You can’t be bipartisan and vote with Bush 90 percent of the time,” said Oregon Democratic Chairwoman Meredith Wood Smith, no relation to the senator. “It just doesn’t work.”

In a Democratic year, Smith was caught up in an electoral tsunami.

And even his surfboard couldn’t help.

Associated Press reporter Matthew Daly in Washington has covered Northwest politics for six years.