Iowa

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President Obama narrowly won the six electoral votes in Iowa, one of the most contested states and the place he credited with igniting his unlikely rise to the presidency.

Mitt Romney spent substantial resources in Iowa early in the primary season and made another big push in the state heading into the election.

In the House, Representative Steve King, a Tea Party firebrand who was first elected in 2002, held on to his seat, fending off a stiff challenge from the Democrat Christie Vilsack, the wife of Tom Vilsack, the current United States secretary of agriculture and a former Iowa governor.

Redistricting in the state caused two longtime congressmen to face off against each other in the Third District. In one of the country’s hardest-fought races, Representative Tom Latham, a nine-term Republican, defeated Representative Leonard L. Boswell, an eight-term Democratic incumbent, by a narrow margin.

During his campaign, Mr. Latham openly disagreed with Mr. Romney, who had created problems for the state’s Republicans by opposing subsidies for wind power, a big industry in Iowa. Mr. Boswell was hampered by problems with fund-raising, and had to rely on Mr. Obama’s extensive operations in the state.

In a closely watched race, voters retained Justice David Wiggins of the state’s Supreme Court. Critics of Justice Wiggins had hoped to remove him, saying that he and his colleagues abused their power in 2009 when they unanimously struck down Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriage. The conservative groups that sought to oust Justice Wiggins were seeking to replicate a successful effort two years ago to remove three other justices on the court. But they faced a far more forceful campaign by gay-rights groups and legal organizations that supported him.