LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton wants delegates from Michigan and Florida to be seated at this summer's Democratic National Convention.

Although the Democratic National Committee's Rules Committee stripped Michigan and Florida of their delegates as punishment for moving up their presidential primaries, Clinton said Friday that she plans to ask her convention delegates to support seating the delegations.

"I believe our nominee will need the enthusiastic support of Democrats in these states to win the general election," she said in a statement, adding that it's important that "we have all 50 states represented and counted at the Democratic convention."

She added that she respected the position of her delegates from other states who may not vote to seat the Michigan and Florida delegates.

The New York senator also called on her Democratic rivals to make the same pledge.

David Plouffe, campaign manager for Barack Obama, said Clinton's move was just a political ploy.

"No one is more disappointed that Florida Democrats will have no role in selecting delegates for the nomination of the party's standard bearer than Senator Obama," Plouffe said in a statement.

"When Senator Clinton was campaigning in Iowa and New Hampshire, she made it clear that states like Michigan and Florida that wouldn't produce any delegates 'don't count for anything.' Now that Senator Clinton's worried about losing the first Southern primary, she's using Florida for her own political gain by trying to assign meaning to a contest that awards zero delegates and where no campaigning has occurred."

Florida has 185 pledged delegates and 25 superdelegates who face not being seated at the convention. The state holds its presidential primary on Tuesday.

Michigan, which held its primary Jan. 15, has been stripped by the DNC of its 156 delegates and its hotel rooms for the Aug. 25-28 Democratic National Convention in Denver.

But the heads of the Democratic parties in Michigan and Florida have said all along that they expect the party's eventual nominee to ask that the delegates be seated.

Although there's no guarantee that Clinton will be the nominee or that other states' delegates will honor her request, Michigan Democratic Chairman Mark Brewer called her support for seating the delegates "very welcome news."

"We did expect in the end we would be seated, based on historical precedents of these types of sanctions being lifted in the past," he said Friday. "No candidate is going to commit political suicide by not seating Michigan."

Florida Democratic Chairwoman Karen Thurman said her state also was too critical to Democrats to be frozen out of the convention.

"Florida will play an extremely important role in this election," she noted Friday in a statement. "We thank Senator Clinton for her support and commitment to the Sunshine State."

A request for comment on Clinton's statement was left Friday afternoon with the John Edwards campaign.

Clinton was the only major candidate on the Democratic ballot in Michigan's primary. She ended up winning 55 percent of the vote, while 40 percent went to Uncommitted.

Most of the voters who chose uncommitted backed Obama or Edwards, who pulled their names from the ballot to avoid angering Iowa and New Hampshire, which didn't like other states crowding to the front of the election calendar.

The Michigan Democratic Party had planned to fill its 128 pledged delegate spots even after they'd been stripped by the Rules Committee. Brewer said he'll figure out how they'll be apportioned as soon as the election results are official. The party also has 28 superdelegates, most of them not pledged to a specific candidate.

Michigan Republicans have been stripped of half of their 60 national convention delegates for holding their primary Jan. 15. But the party still allocated all 57 of its 60 delegates based on the primary results, with 45 going to Mitt Romney, 10 to John McCain and two to Mike Huckabee. The GOP also has three unpledged delegates.

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EDITOR's NOTE: Kathy Barks Hoffman heads the Lansing AP bureau and has covered Michigan politics since 1986.

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On the Net:

Michigan Democratic Party: http://www.michigandems.com

Michigan Republican Party: http://www.migop.org

Clinton campaign: http://www.hillaryclinton.com