2016 United States presidential election
The 2016 United States presidential election was the 58th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 2016. The Republican ticket, businessman Donald Trump and Indiana governor Mike Pence defeated the Democratic ticket of former secretary of state and First Lady of the United States Hillary Clinton and the junior senator from Virginia, Tim Kaine, in what was considered one of the biggest political upsets in American history. It was also the sixth presidential election in which both major party candidates were registered in the same home state; the others have been in 1860, 1904, 1920, 1940, and 1944.
Image: Donald Trump official portrait (3x 4a)
Image: Hillary Clinton by Gage Skidmore 3x 4
The incumbent in 2016, Barack Obama. His second term expired at noon on January 20, 2017.
Image: Donald Trump by Gage Skidmore (cropped)
United States presidential election
The election of the president and the vice president of the United States is an indirect election in which citizens of the United States who are registered to vote in one of the fifty U.S. states or in Washington, D.C., cast ballots not directly for those offices, but instead for members of the Electoral College. These electors then cast direct votes, known as electoral votes, for president, and for vice president. The candidate who receives an absolute majority of electoral votes is then elected to that office. If no candidate receives an absolute majority of the votes for president, the House of Representatives elects the president; likewise if no one receives an absolute majority of the votes for vice president, then the Senate elects the vice president.
A 2016 general election ballot, listing the presidential and vice presidential candidates
A 2008 Democratic caucus meeting in Iowa City, Iowa. The Iowa caucuses are traditionally the first major electoral event of presidential primaries and caucuses.
Madison Square Garden in New York City, the site of the 1976, 1980, and 1992 Democratic National Conventions; and the 2004 Republican National Convention.
The floor of the 2008 Republican National Convention at the Xcel Energy Center in Saint Paul, Minnesota.