The United States presidential election of 2012 is to be held on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. It will be the 57th quadrennial presidential election in which presidential electors, who will actually elect the President and the Vice President of the United States on December 17, 2012, will be chosen. Incumbent President Barack Obama is running for a second and final term during this election.
As specified in the Constitution, the 2012 presidential election will coincide with the United States Senate elections where one-third of the Senators will face re-election (33 this time), and the United States House of Representatives elections (which occurs every two years) to elect the members for the 113th Congress. Eleven gubernatorial elections and many elections for state legislatures will also take place at the same time.
In 2008, Barack Obama defeated Republican John McCain in the presidential election, while the Democrats had net gains in both chambers of the U.S. Congress, maintaining their majorities. The major theme during the 2008 campaign was the American public's general desire of change and reform from both Washington and the policies of outgoing Republican President George W. Bush, who was term limited out of office. The economy and other domestic policies were also dominant issues, especially during the last months of the campaign after the onset of the 2008 economic crisis.
During Obama's presidency, he signed two pieces of economic stimulus - the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in February 2009 and the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010 in December 2010. As President, Obama also signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, and the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010. Obama signed New START, an arms control treaty with Russia, began to gradually withdraw troops from Iraq, began to increase troops in Afghanistan, and enforced the United Nations-sanctioned no-fly zone over Libya. And on May 1, 2011, President Obama ordered the military operation that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.
The Democrats did not fare as well in the 2010 midterm elections, suffering major defeats in many national and state level elections, with many seats switching to Republican control. The Republicans also recaptured the majority in the House of Representatives. Candidates and voters in 2010 focused on the worsening national economic conditions and the economic policies of the Obama Administration and Congressional Democrats. The passage of the controversial Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act also contributed to the low approval ratings of Congress, particularly Democrats, as well as concerns over tax rates and record deficits.The fiscally-focused and quasi-libertarian Tea Party movement became a vocal force in mobilizing voters in 2010 for Republican candidates nationwide.
Polling in 2011 found that Americans were still increasingly frustrated with the U.S. government as a whole, and the Republican Party shared in those high disapproval ratings. In particular, although the majority of Americans felt Obama did not have a successful plan to bring jobs, they trusted Congress even less to create them. The debt-ceiling crisis further eroded public support for Obama, and especially both congressional Republicans and the Tea Party movement.
The 2010 Census changed the Electoral College vote apportionment for the Presidential elections from 2012 to 2020 in the states listed below and mapped right.
States won by Democrats in 2000, 2004, and 2008
• Illinois −1
• Massachusetts −1
• Michigan −1
• New Jersey −1
• New York −2
• Pennsylvania −1
• Washington +1
States won by Republicans in 2000, 2004, and 2008
• Arizona +1
• Georgia +1
• Louisiana −1
• Missouri −1
• South Carolina +1
• Texas +4
• Utah +1 Remaining states
• Florida +2
• Iowa −1
• Nevada +1
• Ohio −2
Eight states (Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and Washington) gained votes, due to reapportionment based on the 2010 Census. Similarly ten states (Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania) lost votes.
In the political climate of 2011, this would give the Democratic Party a net loss of six electoral votes in states won by Al Gore, John Kerry and Barack Obama in the past three presidential elections, rendering the party a national total of 242. Conversely, the Republican Party will achieve a net gain of six electoral votes in states won by George W. Bush and John McCain in the past three presidential elections, rendering the GOP a national total of 181. Votes allocated to remaining states (i.e., those where the majority voted for both Democratic and Republican candidates during the last three presidential elections) remain unchanged from the national total of 115.
In 2011, several states enacted new laws that the Democratic Party attacked as attempts to improve the Republican Party's presidential prospects. Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Tennessee and West Virginia made their early voting periods shorter. Florida and Iowa barred all ex-felons from voting. Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin began requiring voters to identify themselves with government-issued IDs before they could cast their ballots. Barack Obama, the NAACP, and the Democratic Party fought against many of the new state laws, and Bill Clinton denounced it, saying, "There has never been in my lifetime, since we got rid of the poll tax and all the Jim Crow burdens on voting, the determined effort to limit the franchise that we see today".[14] He said the moves would effectively disenfranchise core voter blocs that trend liberal, college students, Blacks, and Latinos. Rolling Stone magazine criticized the American Legislative Exchange Council for lobbying in states to bring about these laws. The Obama campaign fought against the Ohio law, pushing for a petition and statewide referendum to repeal it in time for the 2012 election.
Pennsylvania proposed a new plan that would change its representation in the Electoral College from a winner-take-all model to a district-by-district model. The Governorship and both houses of its congress were Republican-controlled, and the move was seen as an affront to Obama's re-election.
Each party hosts candidates who go through a nomination process to determine the presidential nominee for that party. The nomination process consists of primaries and caucuses, held by the 50 states, Guam, Puerto Rico, Washington, D.C., U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and the Northern Mariana Islands. The winner of each of these primary elections usually receives delegates proportional to the percentage of the popular vote that candidate received in each states. In many Republican primaries, all the state's delegates are awarded to the winning candidate. In the Democratic Party, high-ranking party members known as super delegates each receive one vote in the convention. Whichever candidate has the majority of the delegates at the end of the primary elections is designated the presumptive nominee until he or she is formally nominated and endorsed for the presidency by his or her political party. This is done by the aforementioned delegates for each party at their respective party's national convention.
