President Barack Obama’s recent poll numbers have shown that the American public favors him more. (Associated Press)

With the Republican presidential nomination process in a three-week hiatus after Tuesday night, pundits are focusing in on the man who still holds office.

Six months ago, President Barack Obama’s chances at re-election were low because of the state of the economy.

No presidential incumbent since Franklin Roosevelt has won re-election with unemployment higher than 7.2 percent.

The economy is one of the most important issues in the 2012 presidential election, experts say.

The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that 243,000 jobs were created last month —far above the projected 150,000 jobs that a Bloomberg survey of economists said would be created.

Obama has benefited from the public perception that the economy is improving.

His approval rating increased two percentage points over the last two months.

In his latest speech, he stressed jobs as the number one concern for the executive and legislative branches.

“The economy is growing stronger, the recovering is speeding up and we’ve got to do everything in our power to keep it going,” Obama said.

The president has continued to emphasize the impact a divided Congress has on policy. Tea party members in the House — standing by a platform of balanced spending — have been opposed to many job stimulus packages.

But Obama stressed that there is a long way to go on jobs.

“Now, these numbers will go up and down in the coming months and there are still far too many Americans that need a job, or need a job that pays better than the one they have now,” Obama said.

His speech resonated with many moderate and undecided voters — voters that will eventually decide the outcome of the 2012 election.

“I think Obama’s speech was really inspirational. We’ve been fighting so hard to get America back to where it should be, fighting for a livable wage, more jobs and the ability to be self-sufficient and Obama has been listening,” Cassandra Dean, a college student from Soldotna, Alaska, said in an interview with Yahoo News.

But even more voters were frustrated with Obama’s performance on jobs and other policies.

“I didn’t like Obama when he ran for election, and I still don’t like him now… It’s still the same old, same old. Obama can preach about change all he wants, but America is in the same spot it was when he took office,” Rebecca Windslow, an accountant, told Yahoo News.

As the country continues to grow more divided, Obama’s supporters are hoping that a far-right GOP presidential hopeful will help the president on Election Day.

Candidates like Mitt Romney have had to appeal to an ultraconservative base in the first string of primaries.

Romney’s opponents have jumped at the chance of attacking his record as Massachusetts’s governor.

“RomneyCare and ObamaCare, they’re too similar,” Gingrich said to a crowd of supporters in Ohio on Tuesday. “There’s been a lot of talk about the Obama administration’s attack on the Catholic Church. Well the fact is, Gov. Romney insisted that the Catholic hospitals gave out abortion pills against their religious belief when he was governor.”

Romney, the Republican front-runner for the presidential election, has also been accused of changing his platform on environmental energy, subsidies, healthcare and abortion rights.

An exit poll among primary voters in Florida indicated that four in 10 voters wanted someone else to run for the nomination.

With Republicans uneasy about Romney and his record, Obama is benefitting from a Republican nomination process where big hitters in the Republican Party — Gingrich, Paul and Santorum — continue to fight it out with Romney.

As the election and Republican nomination date grow closer, voters can expect an expensive and close race.

“Primary contests are not easy, and they’re not supposed to be,” Romney said in his Florida primary victory speech. “Our opponents in the other party have been watching, and they like to comfort themselves that a competitive primary will leave us divided and weak. A competitive primary does not divide us, it prepares us and we will win.”