2012 Republican Presidential Candidate | featured news

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich set to announce his candidacy via Facebook and Twitter on Wednesday.

It may have been the moment when former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson extended his riff about how his reality TV show would be different from Sarah Palin’s “crawling on her hands and knees up the ice flow in Alaska.” Or perhaps it was when Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) explained why not everyone would use heroin if it were legalized.

Fox News Channel has terminated the contracts of paid contributors and potential 2012 candidates Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum, a spokesman for the network confirmed to CNN. Contracts for the former House Speaker and former Pennsylvania senator were suspended until May 1 while they considered runs for the White House in 2012. Santorum, who will appear in Thursday's GOP presidential debate in South Carolina, has since formed a presidential exploratory committee....

As Donald Trump boasted that he was "very proud" of prompting President Obama to release his long-form birth certificate, some Republicans on Sunday sharply criticized the flamboyant New York real estate magnate for pushing the "birther" issue. Sen. Lindsey Graham, Gov. Robert McDonnell and Sen. Marco Rubio are among those suggesting Trump's focus on the issue was hurting the GOP cause.

Eager but unofficial GOP contenders for the White House are focusing their criticism on President Barack Obama and taking a kid-gloves approach to one another....

Perhaps more than any movement in recent memory, the tea party has changed American politics over the last two years.

Republican Gov. Haley Barbour bowed out of presidential contention Monday with a surprise announcement just as the 2012 campaign was getting under way in earnest, 18 months before Election Day. The Mississippi governor said he lacked the necessary "absolute fire in the belly" to run....

Representative Ron Paul, who ran for president in 2008, said on Monday he will form an exploratory committee to consider pursuing the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.

Donald Trump says he's considering running in the primary for the Republican presidential nomination, but the real estate mogul didn't vote in primary elections for more than two decades, according to the New York City Board of Elections.

Economic anxiety is driving President Obama's approval rating to nearly its lowest level yet, a new Washington Post/ABC News poll shows, but he still edges out any possible GOP opponent for 2012.