President Obama today spoke to disappointed supporters today in a conference call, explaining why he decided to cancel his stadium convention speech in the Bank of America stadium and move it to an indoor venue.

“The problem was a safety issue.  I could not ask you — our volunteers, our law enforcement, first responders — to subject themselves to the risk of severe thunderstorms,” Obama said, signaling “regret” that the stadium speech was spiked.

President Obama added that “so far, we’ve had an unbelievable convention” and encouraged the volunteers who had tickets to the event to stay involved in the campaign.

“It won’t be as big a crowd and it will be less fanfare and so forth than it would have been in a football stadium, but the spirit, that’s the spirit that’s in everybody’s living rooms and small towns and big cities and suburbs all across the country,” he added.