White House: Elections Weren't About Obama

As Frank said earlier, it's unlikely President Barack Obama' political opponents are going to agree — but the White House is doing its best to make the case that yesterday's elections weren't about the president.

The Associated Press says that:

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters Wednesday that voters went to the polls in Virginia and New Jersey to work through "very local issues that didn't involve the president." The presidential spokesman said voters were concerned about the economy. He said "I don't think the president needed an election or an exit poll to come to that conclusion."

Obama's fellow Democrats lost their gubernatorial bids in both New Jersey and Virginia.

Earlier today, NPR news analyst Juan Williams said he believes it was the economy that drove the results:

Politico's John Harris and Jonathan Martin, though, think that Virginia and New Jersey votes were "an unmistakable rebuke of Democrats, reshuffling Obama's political circumstances in ways likely to have severe near-term consequences for his policy agenda and larger governing strategy."

And even if the results aren't a direct statement about Obama, The Wall Street Journal's Jonathan Weisman and Corey Dade write that the "Republican sweep in Virginia and New Jersey on Tuesday shifted the political terrain against President Barack Obama only a year after his historic election."

The president himself is expected to offer his analysis later today.

Update at 10:55 a.m .ET. NPR's Don Gonyea tells us that Gibbs also said:

— "I think the data from the gubernatorial races demonstrates that voters went to the polls ... to talk about and work through very local issues that didn't involve the president."

— The message the president takes away is that: "You have two very local elections, you had a special election in California which Democrats retained the seat in the 10th district of California. Elements of the Republican Party sought greatly to nationalize the election yesterday in New York (for the 23rd congressional district) ... and they lost."

— Obama is "disappointed that his friend John Corzine didn't win (re-election as governor of New Jersey). Again, I think if you look at the exit polling that is pretty clear on this, people went to the polls to vote on local issues not (to) register support for or opposition to the president."

— The lesson from New York's 23rd congressional district, which a Democrat has won for the first time since before the Civil War, is that: "We watched a party (the GOP) pick a candidate and then purge that candidate. ... So I think it proves that anger can get you 45 % of the vote and that doesn't win you most elections."

— The president did not watch news coverage of the returns as they came in last night.

For more news and analysis of the elections, see Political Junkie.