2012 Presidential Election | featured news

Mitt Romney is starting to hone his appeal to women voters, acutely aware as he turns to the general election that he has little choice but to narrow President Barack Obama's commanding lead among this critical constituency.

At 7 p.m. on Thursday, in the back shed of a firehouse, a presidential candidate who continually concedes he's unlikely to capture the Republican nomination held a rally - and 350 people showed up. Earlier, Newt Gingrich spoke to more than 150 people in nearby Magnolia. And a day earlier, he greeted a sold-out auditorium that seats more than 400 at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington.

Although Rick Santorum won North Dakota's Republican presidential caucuses on March 6, the Associated Press reports that at last weekend's state party convention Mitt Romney ended up with the most supporters among the state's 28 delegates to the Republican National Convention.

President Barack Obama, leading in the polls among women voters, said on Friday he wants to help working women fight discrimination and juggle the demands of motherhood but stopped short of making promises on gender equality if he wins re-election.

I was on Morning Joe Thursday to talk about Paul Ryan’s budget. But the segment before mine was on Mitt Romney’s emergence as the Republican Party’s clear nominee. And the panel — Scarborough in particular — seemed downright dejected. The consensus was that no one likes Romney. Not Republicans, not Democrats, and probably not independents. The expectation is that he will run a joyless, careful, negative, insincere campaign. It will be a bummer for the country and a lost opportunity for the right.

Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum, in what may be a grim development for his campaign, has lost the lead in his home state of Pennsylvania to front-runner Mitt Romney, according to a poll released on Thursday.

Mitt Romney took a sharper line of attack against President Obama on Wednesday, accusing the Democratic incumbent of waging a “hide-and-seek campaign” that disguises his intentions and offers no solutions for the country’s most intransigent economic problems.

Arizona senator jokes Romney should pick Sarah Palin for his running mate as he calls for Santorum to make "graceful exit." "I think we have some very qualified candidate, obviously Marco Rubio is in the top tier, Chris Christie, there are a number of candidates we have out there, Bobby Jindal, Mitch Daniels. We have a wealth of talent out there and I am sure that Mitt will make the right choice," McCain said, referring the Florida senator, and three governors from New Jersey, Louisiana and Indiana, respectively.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio says Republican Mitt Romney will win the White House, but not with Rubio on the ticket.

The Rick Santorum campaign is formally calling on Newt Gingrich to drop out of the race and endorse the former Pennsylvania senator, following Tuesday night's three-primary sweep by Mitt Romney. Santorum's communications director Hogan Gidley made the statement during a Wednesday appearance on MSNBC.