Nevada, 2012 Presidential Election | featured news

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.

Why the battle to take credit for Ohio’s ever-so-slightly above-average economy could swing the presidential election...While most of the debate nationally still revolves around why the economy remains so pathetic, there are several pivotal states — Ohio, Florida, Nevada, Virginia — where things are slowly turning around.

In a campaign fast growing nasty, the Republican National Committee is trying a gentler approach... Several Republicans who weren't involved in making the ad say a softer approach may be essential to the effort to defeat Obama in November, given polls showing him with strong personal favorability ratings. The ad is airing in Ohio, Virginia, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Colorado and Iowa.

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.

President Obama, Republican challenger Mitt Romney, and their allies have already spent $87 million on TV ads, the Associated Press reports -- most of it in nine battleground states. They are, not surprisingly, nine toss-up states that will likely decide the election: Florida, Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Nevada and New Hampshire.

Mitt Romney has a chance on Saturday to do what no Republican presidential candidate has done so far this cycle: win two contests back to back.

Three of the four Republican candidates for president will make a flurry of campaign appearances across Nevada on Friday as they seek to get out the vote just a day before the state's caucuses.

The GOP presidential nominating calendar is becoming clearer now that Nevada has agreed to move its caucuses to Feb. 4.

The relentless push forward of the presidential nominating calendar could move the Iowa caucuses into December. The latest development came late Wednesday when Nevada Republican Chairwoman Amy Tarkanian said her state's caucuses would be Jan. 14 instead of Feb. 18.