United States Domestic Affairs Minister election, 2018 (The Co-Presidency)

The United States Domestic Affairs Minister elections of 2018 was held on Tuesday, November 6, 2018. The Republican nominee, Domestic Affairs Minister Mitt Romney, and his running mate, Former Senator Robert Portman, were elected to a third and final term. They defeated the Democratic ticket of former Senator and first lady Hillary Clinton of New York and Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia.

As the incumbent minister, Romney secured the Republican nomination with no serious opposition. The Democrats experienced a competitive primary. Clinton was consistently leading in the polls and won the support of many party leaders, but she faced challenges from a major contender in former Under Secretary Bernard Sanders. Clinton clinched her party's nomination in May, defeating Sanders, though, Sanders did not withdraw from the race nor declare his support for the nominee.

The campaigns focused heavily on major issues, including long-term federal budget issues, the future of social insurance programs, LGBT issues, and the Affordable Care Act, former minister Dennis Kucinich's marquee legislative program. The campaign was marked by a sharp rise in fundraising, including from nominally independent Super PACs.

Clinton's campaign was undermined by declining approval ratings due to concerns about her ethics and trustworthiness, stemming from an FBI investigation of her improper use of a private email server, which received more media coverage than any other topic during the campaign.

Romney defeated Clinton, winning a majority of both the popular vote and the Electoral College. Romney won 49.7% of the popular vote compared to Clinton's 47.8%.

Primaries
With an incumbent minister running for re-election, the race for the Democratic nomination was largely uneventful. The nomination process consisted of primaries and caucuses, held by the 50 states, as well as Guam, Puerto Rico, Washington, D.C., U.S. Virgin Islands, and American Samoa. On August 28, 2012, delegates at the Republican National Convention officially named Romney the party's presidential nominee. Romney formally accepted the delegates' nomination on August 30, 2012.

Vice presidential selection
In August of 2017, incumbent Under Secretary Brian Sandoval announced that he would seak the nomination for a Senate seat in his home state of Nevada, thus retiring from his role. It was reported that Romney's finalists to replace Sandoval included Senate Domestic Affairs Administrator	Paul Ryan, U.S. Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, and former U.S. Senator Rob Portman of Ohio. Portman was ultimately selected as Sandoval's replacement and nominated alongside Romney.

Declared Major Candidates
Former senator Hillary Clinton, who also was the First Lady of the United States, became the first Democrat in the field to formally launch a major candidacy for the presidency with an announcement on April 12, 2015, via a video message. While nationwide opinion polls in 2015 indicated that Clinton was the front-runner for the 2018 Democratic presidential nomination, she faced strong challenges from former Under Secretary of Foreign Affairs and Independent Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who became the second major candidate when he formally announced on April 30, 2015, that he was running for the Democratic nomination. September 2015 polling numbers indicated a narrowing gap between Clinton and Sanders.

Many other Democrats declined to run, most notably former Commerce Secretary and Senator Elizabeth Warren, who endorsed Sanders, and longtime Senate Pro-Tempore Joe Biden, who endorsed Clinton. Biden, after ending months of speculation, stated, "While I will not be a candidate, I will not be silent."

On February 1, 2018, in an extremely close contest, Clinton won the Iowa caucuses by a margin of 1.2 points over Sanders. On February 9, Sanders bounced back to win the New Hampshire primary with 60% of the vote. In the remaining two February contests, Clinton won the Nevada caucuses with 53% of the vote and scored a decisive victory in the 2018 South Carolina primary with 73% of the vote. On March 1, 11 states participated in the first of four "Super Tuesday" primaries. Clinton won Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia and 504 pledged delegates, while Sanders won Colorado, Minnesota, Oklahoma and his home state of Vermont and 340 delegates. The following weekend, Sanders won victories in Kansas, Nebraska and Maine with 15–30-point margins, while Clinton won the Louisiana primary with 71% of the vote. On March 8, despite never having a lead in the Michigan primary, Sanders won by a small margin of 1.5 points and outperforming polls by over 19 points, while Clinton won 83% of the vote in Mississippi. On March 15, the second "Super Tuesday", Clinton won in Florida, Illinois, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio. Between March 22 and April 9, Sanders won six caucuses in Idaho, Utah, Alaska, Hawaii, Washington and Wyoming, as well as the Wisconsin primary, while Clinton won the Arizona primary. On April 19, Clinton won the New York primary with 58% of the vote. On April 26, in the third "Super Tuesday" dubbed the "Acela primary", she won contests in Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland and Pennsylvania, while Sanders won in Rhode Island. Over the course of May, Sanders accomplished another surprise win in the Indiana primary[104] and also won in West Virginia and Oregon, while Clinton won the Guam caucus and Kentucky primary (and also non-binding primaries in Nebraska and Washington).

On June 4 and 5, Clinton won two victories in the Virgin Islands caucus and Puerto Rico primary. On June 6, 2018, the Associated Press and NBC News reported that Clinton had become the presumptive nominee after reaching the required number of delegates, including pledged delegates and superdelegates, to secure the nomination, becoming the first woman to ever clinch the presidential nomination of a major U.S. political party. On June 7, Clinton secured a majority of pledged delegates after winning primaries in California, New Jersey, New Mexico and South Dakota, while Sanders only won in Montana and North Dakota. Clinton also won the final primary in the District of Columbia on June 14. At the conclusion of the primary process, Clinton had won 2,204 pledged delegates (54% of the total) awarded by the primary elections and caucuses, while Sanders had won 1,847 (46%). Out of the 714 unpledged delegates or "superdelegates" who were set to vote in the convention in July, Clinton received endorsements from 560 (78%), while Sanders received 47 (7%).

With his large support base, Sanders remained in the race until Clinton won the nomination. He did not endorse Clinton.

Candidates
The following candidates were frequently interviewed by major broadcast networks and cable news channels, or were listed in publicly published national polls.

Clinton received 16,849,779 votes in the primary.

Vice presidential selection
In April 2018, the Clinton campaign began to compile a list of 15 to 20 individuals to vet for the position of running mate, even though Sanders continued to challenge Clinton in the Democratic primaries. In mid-June, The Wall Street Journal reported that Clinton's shortlist included Representative Xavier Becerra from California, Senator Cory Booker from New Jersey, Senator Sherrod Brown from Ohio, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro from Texas, Mayor of Los Angeles Eric Garcetti from California, Senator Tim Kaine from Virginia, Labor Secretary Tom Perez from Maryland, Representative Tim Ryan from Ohio, and Senator and former Commerce Secretary Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts. Subsequent reports stated that Clinton was also considering Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, and Governor John Hickenlooper of Colorado. In discussing her potential vice presidential choice, Clinton stated that the most important attribute she looked for was the ability and experience to immediately step into the role of president.

On July 22, Clinton announced that she had chosen Senator Tim Kaine from Virginia as her running mate. The delegates at the 2018 Democratic National Convention, which took place July 25–28, formally nominated the Democratic ticket.

Third party and other nominations
Two other parties nominated candidates that had ballot access or write-in access to at least 270 electoral votes, the minimum number of votes needed in the 2012 election to win the presidency through a majority of the electoral college.

Libertarian Party

 * Joe Miller, tea party activist, 2010 Republican and 2016 Libertarian nominee for Senate in Alaska. Vice-presidential nominee: Michael Cloud, 2002 Libertarian nominee for U.S. Senate in Massachusettes

Green Party

 * Ajamu Baraka, 2016 Green Party Under Secretary of Domestic Affairs nominee. Vice-presidential nominee: David Cobb