2012 Presidential Election, Barack Obama Re-election | featured news

A new ad from President Obama's re-election team stresses the bad economy he inherited, and signs that things are coming back.

The Value City Arena on the campus of Ohio State University didn’t quite fill up for President Obama Saturday morning — and that wasn’t the only sign that 2012 will be different from the heady days of 2008.

At the gatherings, the president, who will formally open his re-election campaign on Saturday, and a tight circle of advisers gird for the coming battle with Mitt Romney.

Republican-leaning areas in states vital to President Barack Obama's re-election prospects are drawing top-tier Democratic congressional candidates who, even if they lose, could help turn out the vote and boost Obama's chances of winning a second term....

The improving economy is swinging the pendulum in President Barack Obama's favor in the 14 states where the presidential election will likely be decided. Recent polls show Obama gaining an edge over his likely Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, in several so-called swing states — those that are considered up for grabs.

President Barack Obama is embracing an unlikely group of political icons as he tries to paint Mitt Romney as extreme: He's praising Republican presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan....

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.

Former President Bill Clinton says he believes President Barack Obama can win re-election if he can persuade voters he steadied a shaky economy.

Thanks to the circular firing squad nature of the 2012 Republican presidential primaries, it had begun to look as if President Obama would coast to re-election in November. But then came along high gas prices. The recent dramatic increase in gas prices could become the issue that slows the economy, stalls the recovery and sinks the president's chances at a second term.

President Obama is struggling to draw in big-dollar donations, with half as many people writing large checks to his campaign than at this point four years ago.