Hillary Rodham Clinton, then junior United States senator from New York, announced her campaign for the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries on her website on January 20, 2007.

For several months Clinton led opinion polls among Democratic candidates by substantial margins until Senator Barack Obama pulled close to or even with her.

[4] She placed third in the Iowa caucus behind Barack Obama and John Edwards,[5] and trailed considerably in polls shortly thereafter in New Hampshire before staging a comeback and finishing first in the primary there.

Clinton subsequently lost in Wyoming, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina and Oregon, and won in Pennsylvania, Indiana, West Virginia, Kentucky, Puerto Rico, and South Dakota.

In the general election, Barack Obama defeated Senator and Republican nominee John McCain of Arizona, and nominated Clinton as the 67th Secretary of State, an office in which she served until February 2013.

In January, Williams had been brought in on a thirty-day assignment as a senior advisor, and had demanded clarity in the chain of command with the authority to settle internal strategy and policy disputes, threatening to leave the campaign.

[37] Chief campaign strategist Mark Penn resigned on April 6, 2008, amid controversy surrounding his work with the Colombian government and the free trade bill opposed by many big unions.

In January 2007 Clinton announced that she would forgo public financing for both the primary and general elections due to the spending limits imposed when accepting the federal money.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, John Grisham, Magic Johnson, Ronald Perelman, Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, Steven Spielberg and many others.

[45][46] In late August 2007, HillRaiser Norman Hsu came into considerable negative publicity when it was revealed that he was a 15-year-long fugitive on investment fraud charges[47] and had also possibly engaged in violations of campaign finance law as a "bundler".

[59] Rebounding from weak fundraising in January 2008, Sen. Clinton expected to raise $35 million in February 2008—a figure rival Sen. Barack Obama's campaign said it would surpass.

[75] A California Democratic Party query at the time in June was responded to by the Clinton campaign's western finance director: "I can tell you with 100 certainty that Norman Hsu is not involved in a ponzi scheme.

Clinton's third quarter campaign expenditures report showed the $800,000 in contributions, mostly Hsu-related, being returned to more than 200 donors, some of whom were surprised to see the money coming back and who said they knew not of Hsu.

[83] In March 2007, a Pakistani immigrant named Abdul Rehman Jinnah was indicted by a grand jury for violating federal election laws.

"[85] In October 2007, an article in the Los Angeles Times stated that, "Dishwashers, waiters and others whose jobs and dilapidated home addresses seem to make them unpromising targets for political fundraisers are pouring $1,000 and $2,000 contributions into Clinton's campaign treasury.

And Clinton's success in gathering money from Chinatown's least-affluent residents stems from a two-pronged strategy: mutually beneficial alliances with powerful groups, and appeals to the hopes and dreams of people now consigned to the margins."

"[95] An October 29, 2007 study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy found that Clinton had received the most media coverage of any of the 2008 presidential candidates, being the subject of 17 percent of all stories.

[98] Washington Post media analyst Howard Kurtz found a number of journalists who agreed with the claim,[98] with Mark Halperin, Time magazine's editor-at-large for political news, saying, "Your typical reporter has a thinly disguised preference that Barack Obama be the nominee.

Air America Radio host Rachel Maddow and political analyst Patrick Buchanan both noted the high turnout among women, and asserted that the media coverage made Clinton a sympathetic figure to female voters.

"[105][106] While this incited more controversy, Matthews noted that Clinton's political career started after she appeared with Senator Chuck Schumer and impressed Democratic leaders with her graceful handling of the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

[111] In a February 12 interview with Chris Plante on WMAL-AM, "former President Bill Clinton implied the media has been unfair to his wife, stated that she was standing up to sexism when she took on NBC, and -- when asked about MSNBC's David Shuster's comments about his daughter, Chelsea -- said there was a double standard.

Although Clinton was the 25th woman to run for U.S. president,[115] she was the first female candidate to have held a highly probable chance of winning the nomination of a major party, and the presidential election.

In March 2006, actress Sharon Stone expressed her doubt about Clinton's presidential chances, saying "Hillary still has sexual power, and I don't think people will accept that.

The Washington Post revisited this question based on a new incident in July 2007,[125] which provoked a widespread round of media self-criticism about whether it was a legitimate topic or not;[126] the Clinton campaign then used claimed outrage at the reporting for fundraising purposes.

And Hillary Clinton's laugh was being described as a cackle,"[128] making reference to a flurry of media coverage two months prior about the physical nature and political motivation of her aural indication of amusement.

[129] Tanya Romaniuk also described how "the news media reshaped the kinds of meanings and values attached to" Clinton's 'cackle' characterization, "and concomitantly (re)produced and reinforced a stereotypically gendered, negative (i.e., sexist, misogynist) perception of her.

"[136] Further discussion ensued when the Drudge Report and a few other media outlets ran an unflattering Associated Press photograph of Clinton looking old and tired on the wintry Iowa campaign trail;[137] Limbaugh sympathized with the plight of American women in an appearance-obsessed culture, then asked, "Will this country want to actually watch a woman get older before their eyes on a daily basis?

A New York Times article stated, "Mrs. Clinton and Ms. Palin have little in common beyond their breakout performances at the conventions and the soap opera aspects of their family lives.

Former Hewlett-Packard chief executive and McCain advisor Carly Fiorina blasted that one of the Saturday Night Live parodies of Sarah Palin in a television interview: "They were defining Hillary Clinton as very substantive and Sarah Palin as totally superficial,"[146] and an ABC News headline soon after ran, "Now the McCain Campaign's Complaining that Saturday Night Live Skit Was 'Sexist'".

"[150] In mid September 2008, a flurry of articles circulated announcing that "Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin plan to appear next week at the same rally in New York City – perhaps the closest the two history-making women will be to each other before Election Day.