Events in the year 2010 in the United States.
Incumbents
Federal government President: Barack Obama (D-Illinois) Vice President: Joe Biden (D-Delaware) Chief Justice: John Roberts (Maryland) Speaker of the House of Representatives: Nancy Pelosi (D-California) Senate Majority Leader: Harry Reid (D-Nevada) Congress: 111th
State governments Governors and lieutenant governors Governors
Lieutenant governors
Demographics
Events
January
January 1 Same-sex marriage becomes legal in New Hampshire. Illinois' ban on texting while driving goes into effect. Additionally, cellular telephone use is banned entirely while driving through a highway construction or school speed zone in Illinois. January 2 – North Carolina bans smoking in bars, restaurants, public places, and vehicles. The new law exempts cigar bars, private clubs, and some hotel/motels. January 9 – A 6.5 Eureka earthquake shakes the north coast of California with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VI (Strong), causing $21.8–43 million in losses and 35 injuries. January 13 Google announces that they were the target of a cyber attack from China. The incident prompts the company to consider pulling out of China. The U.S. Department of State confirms 104 American people are among the victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, including at least four people directly affiliated with the U.S. government. U.S. President Barack Obama holds a press conference discussing the operations of the U.S. government organizations such as USAID and the U.S. Department of Defense in the response to the 2010 Haiti earthquake. January 14 – Barack Obama commits $100,000,000 to help Haiti recover from the 2010 earthquake, while calling on former presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton to assist Haiti. January 16 – U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and USAID Director Rajiv Shah travel to Haiti. January 19 – The U.S. special election is held in Massachusetts to elect a new Senator to take the vacant seat held by the late Ted Kennedy. Republican Scott Brown beats State Attorney General Martha Coakley, who had earlier been considered a certain winner. January 21 – Citizens United vs. FEC: The Supreme Court of the United States rules that the First Amendment prohibits restrictions on independent political expenditures by corporations, associations, and unions. January 25 – U.S. President Barack Obama hosts the Los Angeles Lakers at the White House for winning the 2009 NBA Finals. January 27 – U.S. President Barack Obama in his first State of the Union Address emphasizes the nation's economy, job creation, putting an end to the don't ask, don't tell policy in the military, and restated his commitment for healthcare reform in the nation. January 28 – U.S. President Barack Obama travels to MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, where he met with crew helping with the humanitarian response to the 2010 Haiti earthquake, before holding a town hall meeting at the University of Tampa.
February February – The job market hits a post-recession bottom of 129,655,000 payroll employees, a decline of 8,710,000 from the peak in December 2007. February 1 – Japanese car company Toyota announces a fix for car accelerator problems and recalls cars in the United States. February 2 – The Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs opens a worshipping site for earth-centered religions on their campus promoting religious tolerance. February 5 The Tea Party movement, which gained momentum in 2009 during the national healthcare debate, host their first convention in Nashville, Tennessee.
February 7 A gas line explodes at a Middletown, Connecticut power plant under construction, killing 5 people. Super Bowl XLIV is played at Sun Life Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, between the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts. The Saints carried a 31–17 victory over the Colts and won their first world championship. The featured half-time show performance was given by The Who. February 8 – The 100th anniversary of the Boy Scouts of America. February 11 – Mentally disabled woman Jennifer Daugherty is tortured and stabbed to death by six people in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. The perpetrators become known as "The Greensburg Six". February 12 2010 University of Alabama in Huntsville shooting Amy Bishop, a biology professor at the University of Alabama, opens fire at the Huntsville campus, killing at least three people. When she was 21, Bishop fatally shot her 18-year-old brother, Seth Bishop, on December 6, 1986, at their home in Braintree, Massachusetts. The incident was initially classified as an "accident" by Braintree police. On June 16, 2010, Bishop was charged with first degree murder in her brother's death nearly 24 years after his shooting. The single "We Are the World 25 for Haiti" was released and debuted on 12 February 2010 during an opening ceremony of the 2010 Winter Olympics. February 12–28 – The United States compete at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, and win 9 gold, 15 silver, and 13 bronze medals. February 17 Three employees of Tesla Motors are killed when the small aircraft they were flying crashes into a house in a residential neighborhood. Haiti frees most of the members of an Idaho Baptist missionary group who were charged with child trafficking and kidnapping in the wake of the 2010 Haiti earthquake. February 18 The Women's Medical Society abortion clinic in Philadelphia is raided by the FBI in an investigation into suspected illegal drug prescription use. The raid uncovers extreme unsanitary operations, use of untrained staff, and eventually leads to charges against a number of staff members for murdering babies at the clinic. After setting fire to his home, Andrew Joseph Stack commits suicide by flying his private plane directly into an IRS building in Austin, Texas. U.S. President Barack Obama issues Executive Order 13531, establishing the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. February 23 – The United States Navy officially announces that it will end its ban of women in submarines. February 25 – Incident at SeaWorld Orlando: A SeaWorld employee in Orlando, Florida, is killed by a killer whale during a live performance. February 26 – New York Governor David Paterson announces that he will not be a candidate in the Democratic primary for the November gubernatorial election.
March
March U.S. tomato shortage, which lasts until April, begins. First section of Brooklyn Bridge Park opens in New York. March 3 – The District of Columbia's same-sex marriage law goes into effect. March 5 – Former Jefferson County, Alabama, commission president and mayor of Birmingham Larry Langford is sentenced to 15 years in prison for soliciting bribes related to municipal bond swaps. March 7 – The 82nd Academy Awards, hosted by Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin, are held at Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. Kathryn Bigelow's The Hurt Locker wins six awards out of nine nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director, with Bigelow the first female to win the latter. The film is tied in nominations with James Cameron's Avatar. The telecast garners over 41.6 million viewers, making it the most-watched Oscar broadcast since 2005. The awards are marked by the reintroduction of the Best Picture award featuring 10 nominees, the first occurrence since 1944. March 8 – Friendly Fire: The Illusion of Justice memoir is published.Tsang, Daniel. Friendly Fire: The Illusion of Justice (Book Review). Surf City Voice. Retrieved on 2010-1-6. March 19 – NASA announces that 2010 will likely become the warmest year on record due to global warming, based on an analysis of temperature record data from the Goddard Institute for Space Studies. March 21 – The United States House of Representatives passes the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and its companion, the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 by votes of 219–212 and 220–211, respectively. March 23 Barack Obama signs the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law, aiming to insure 95% of Americans. 14 states (Virginia, Florida, South Carolina, Nebraska, Texas, Utah, Louisiana, Alabama, Michigan, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Washington, Idaho, and South Dakota) announce plans to sue the federal government over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. March 26 – How to Train Your Dragon is released in theaters. March 28 – World Wrestling Entertainment holds WrestleMania XXVI at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, drawing a crowd of 72, 219. March 28–30 – Nine people thought to be Hutaree militia members are arrested in Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana for their alleged involvement in a plot to kill police officers and possibly civilians using explosives and/or firearms.
April
April 1 – Official tabulation of the 2010 US Census begins. April 3 – Apple releases the first iPad in the U.S. April 4 – The 7.2 Baja California earthquake occurred on Easter Sunday with a moment magnitude a maximum Mercalli intensity of VII (Very strong). The shock originated at 15:40:41 local time south of Guadalupe Victoria, Baja California, Mexico. The 89-second quake was widely felt throughout the Western United States, some southern states, and northwest Mexico and was also felt across a large swath of North America. It was also the strongest to rock Southern California in at least 18 years (since the 1992 Landers earthquake, M 7.3). Most of the damage occurred in the twin cities of Mexicali and Calexico on the Mexico–United States border. There were at least two fatalities in Mexicali, one of which was caused by a collapsed house. Major damage to irrigation systems occurred, severely impacting over 80,000 acres of agriculture in the Mexicali Valley. April 5 A coal mine owned by Massey Energy in Montcoal, West Virginia, explodes, killing at least 25 miners. North Dakota joins the 14 other states suing the federal government over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Adventure Time premieres on Cartoon Network.Adventure Time – Coming April 5 CartoonNetwork.com April 5–20 – STS-131: Space Shuttle Discovery delivers a Multi-Purpose Logistics Module to the International Space Station. April 6 – Arizona becomes the 16th state to sue the federal government over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. April 8 – The Pittsburgh Penguins play the final regular season game at Civic Arena with a 7-3 victory over the New York Islanders the arena will be torn down to make way for PPG Paints Arena which will open next season. The last game ever is a 5-2 playoff loss to the Montreal Canadiens on May 12. April 13 Georgia becomes the 17th state to sue the federal government over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. NewsTilt – A news website for independent professional journalists is launched. April 15 – President Barack Obama delivers a major speech on the future of NASA's human spaceflight program. He commits to increasing NASA funding by $6 billion over five years and completing the design of a new heavy-lift launch vehicle by 2015 and to begin construction thereafter. He also predicts a U.S. crewed orbital Mars mission by the mid-2030s. April 20 An explosion occurs on BP's Deepwater Horizon oil rig, killing 11 workers, causing the rig to sink two days later and initiating a massive offshore oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico; this environmental disaster is now considered the largest in U.S. history. 4 May 2010 Alaska becomes the 18th state to sue the federal government over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. April 22 – A Boeing X-37B is launched from Cape Canaveral on mission USA-212. April 23 – Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signs the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act, which is the broadest and strictest anti-illegal immigration measure in decades. It receives national and international attention and has spurred considerable controversy.