WASHINGTON (AP) – A few Democratic candidates joined Republicans Wednesday in pressing John Kerry to apologize for a comment critics said appeared disrespectful of American troops as several Kerry campaign appearances were canceled.

“Whatever the intent, Senator Kerry was wrong to say what he said,” said Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr., running for Senate in Tennessee.

“Sen. Kerry’s remarks were poorly worded and just plain stupid,” said Montana Senate President Jon Tester, a Democrat trying to unseat Senator Burns. “He owes our troops and their families an apology.”

“I’m sorry he did what he did. But I think the issue … we want to make sure it doesn’t confuse the subject of the war in Iraq,” Democratic Rep. Ben Cardin, running for Senate in Maryland, said on CNN.

The White House didn’t back down from its call for a Kerry apology. White House press secretary Tony Snow said Kerry “put gasoline on the fire” of an already sizzling midterm election campaign. And the Republican National Committee released a Web ad, to be e-mailed to Republican activists and state party officials, called “Apologize.”

“Sen. Kerry may have botched the line, but what he said was insulting to the troops, and what he ought to say is, ‘Look, I botched the line, but I’m sorry for giving offense,’ ” Mr. Snow said on CBS’s “The Early Show.”

At issue is Mr. Kerry’s comment, to a group of California students on Monday, that people unable to succeed in the American educational system would likely “get stuck in Iraq.” Mr. Kerry says he merely botched a speech line written to be critical of Mr. Bush, while Republicans seized on it as evidence of troop-bashing by the Democratic party’s 2004 presidential nominee.

The backdrop for the fiery exchange evoked memories of President Bush and Mr. Kerry’s bitter 2004 race for the White House, and injected last-minute fireworks into a taut midterm election fight between Republicans trying to cling to control of Congress and Democrats striving to win it back.

With each party looking for any advantage in a race expected to turn in large measure on the unpopular war in Iraq, Mr. Kerry campaign appearances in Iowa, Minnesota and Pennsylvania were canceled.

A spokesman for Democratic congressional candidate Bruce Braley in Iowa said Mr. Braley had decided independently to cancel an event with Mr. Kerry scheduled for Thursday. Mr. Braley, who is running against Republican Mike Whalen, said in a statement that the White House and Mr. Kerry should stop bickering and focus on how to change course in Iraq.

Meredith Salsbery, a spokeswoman for congressional candidate Tim Walz, said Mr. Kerry made the final decision but acknowledged campaign officials were worried that the controversy would distract from his effort to unseat incumbent Republican Rep. Gil Gutknecht.

Mr. Kerry spokesman David Wade confirmed he no longer would appear at a Philadelphia rally on Wednesday for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bob Casey.

“We made a decision not to allow the Republican hate machine to use Democratic candidates as proxies in their distorted spin war,” Mr. Wade said.

Mr. Kerry, meanwhile, sought frantically to contain the damage – to his party in next week’s elections and his own potential repeat run for the White House in 2008. He and some Democrats viewed the fracas as a key test of a lesson learned in the 2004 race – that he responded too slowly when hit with unsubstantiated allegations about his Vietnam war record from a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

Mr. Kerry’s office released a supportive statement from retired Lt. Gen. Claudia J. Kennedy, the first female three-star general in the Army and a supporter of his 2004 bid against Mr. Bush. “When it comes to Iraq, he’s right to stand up against baseless attacks, and right to keep fighting for a better course for our troops and our country,” she said.

Senator Schumer, head of the Democratic campaign effort, called the White House attacks on Mr. Kerry an effort by Mr. Bush “to divert attention from his failed Iraq policy.”

“Instead of going on television attacking John Kerry and everyone else under the sun, the president ought to be sitting at his desk coming up with a plan for Iraq,” Mr. Schumer said.

The head of the Democratic party also downplayed Mr. Kerry’s remarks. “Kerry made a blooper. Bloopers happen,” Howard Dean told reporters in Burlington, Vt.

Mr. Snow said Mr. Kerry – not the White House – was the one who “whipped this up into a big issue.”

Mr. Bush, campaigning in Georgia Tuesday night, said Mr. Kerry’s statement was “insulting and it is shameful” hours after Mr. Snow unleashed a harsh attack on the Massachusetts senator.

Mr. Kerry told a hastily arranged news conference in Seattle: “I apologize to no one for my criticism of the president and of his broken policy.”

But he also said the comment was “a botched joke about the president and the president’s people, not about the troops … and they know that’s what I was talking about.”

What Mr. Kerry said Monday at a campaign rally was this: “You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

A Kerry spokeswoman, Amy Brundage, said later that the senator’s prepared text had called for him to say: “Do you know where you end up if you don’t study, if you aren’t smart, if you’re intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq. Just ask President Bush.”

Senator McCain said Wednesday he wasn’t sure “how you could construe” Mr. Kerry’s comment as a joke. Calling Mr. Kerry “my friend,” the Arizona Republican said, “I’ve found that if it is just a botched joke then apologize and move on.”

“As it stands, he owes an apology to the men and women who are serving in Iraq out of patriotism and love of country, not because of any academic deficiencies,” Mr. McCain said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”