Wisconsin, 2012 Presidential Election | featured news

President Obama sought to shore up his standing in Midwestern states, including Iowa and Wisconsin, while Mitt Romney fought to secure critical states like Florida and Virginia.

Less than a week before Election Day, President Barack Obama holds a statistically significant lead over Republican nominee Mitt Romney in the battleground of Iowa, while the two candidates are locked in tight races in New Hampshire and Wisconsin.

Unemployment rates fell or held steady last month in nine key swing states at the center of this year's presidential election. Rates dropped in Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, Colorado, Iowa, Nevada and North Carolina. They were unchanged in New Hampshire and Virginia.

President Obama leads Mitt Romney in Ohio while the two candidates are neck-and-neck in Florida and Wisconsin, according to a new poll of the three swing states. The polling by Quinnipiac University/New York Times/CBS News shows the race tightening in Florida and Wisconsin. Romney is getting a small boost in these states from his selection of Rep. Paul Ryan, who hails from Wisconsin.

While nationally the two rivals are locked in a dead heat, in 12 expected battleground states — Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin — Obama leads by eight points in the survey.

For Republicans and Mitt Romney, Minnesota is looking like the state that might have been. It was long a fly-over state for presidential candidates - not worth a visit, since it voted reliably Democrat. After strong gains in 2010 midterm elections, though, conservatives thought they had a real chance to change that.

The Obama campaign says there is plenty of evidence that the president remains strong in Wisconsin.

Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican who has sought to limit collective bargaining, faces a tough race that has implications for unions and the results of the presidential election.

Polls are open in Maryland, the District and Wisconsin, where Tuesday’s Republican primaries could move Mitt Romney closer to a nomination that has hovered just out of his reach. Romney is favored to win in all three jurisdictions: the closest race appears to be in Wisconsin, where recent polls have shown him with a single-digit lead over former Sen. Rick Santorum (Pa.)

GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney is joined by his latest supporter, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., as he tries to garner support before the state's upcoming caucuses.