Events in the year 2014 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: John Boehner (R-Ohio) Senate Majority Leader: Harry Reid (D-Nevada) Congress: 113th

State governments Governors and lieutenant governors Governors

Lieutenant governors

Events

January January 1 The following laws go into effect: Thirteen states – Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Missouri, Montana, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington – all increase their minimum wages. Numerous provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, go into effect. Provisions of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, signed into law by then-President George W. Bush, go into effect, banning the sale of 40-to-60 watt incandescent light bulbs throughout the nation. The state of Oregon bans smoking in vehicles when children are present. The state of Colorado allows the sale of recreational cannabis from legally licensed businesses. A building explosion kills three and injures 13 in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota. The cause is yet to be determined. January 2 – Satmar Hasidic businessman Menachem Stark of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, is kidnapped during a snowstorm and found murdered the next day in Great Neck, New York, after a botched robbery.A Developer Is Mourned and Vilified in Brooklyn New York Times, January 5, 2014 January 6 2014 BCS National Championship Game: The number-one-ranked Florida State Seminoles beats the number-two-ranked Auburn Tigers at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, by a score of 34–31. The 2014 North American polar vortex hits the Northern United States, breaking coldest temperature records throughout the entire country. January 7 – All 50 states in the U.S. experience temperatures below 0 °C (32 °F). The National Weather Service observes that "It's not unprecedented, but it is unusual." January 8 – The Baseball Writers' Association of America Baseball Hall of Fame announces its inductees. Pitchers Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine and slugger Frank Thomas are enshrined. Maddux sees his name appear on 97.2 percent of the ballots, falling short of the all-time mark still held by Tom Seaver, who was elected with 98.84 percent of the vote in 1992. Glavine receives 91.9 percent of the vote while Thomas is elected with 83.7 percent. January 9 Cygnus CRS Orb-1, the second flight of the Orbital Sciences Cygnus uncrewed cargo spacecraft, launches successfully at 13:07 EST. A steel storage tank near Charleston, West Virginia, leaks the chemical 4-Methylcyclohexanemethanol (MCHM) in large quantities into the Elk River, part of the watershed of the Mississippi River, leaving 300,000 people in nine West Virginia counties without clean water. January 13 – Retired law enforcement officer Curtis Reeves fatally shoots Chad Oulson. January 14 – A federal judge rules that Oklahoma's ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional but immediately stays the ruling. January 16 – Nominations for the 86th Academy Awards are announced at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills, California. The nominees for Best Picture are 12 Years a Slave, American Hustle, Captain Phillips, Dallas Buyers Club, Gravity, Her, Nebraska, Philomena, and The Wolf of Wall Street. January 20 – A feed processing plant in Omaha, Nebraska, explodes, killing two people. January 25 – A gunman identified as 19-year-old Darion Marcus Aguilar opens fire at a shopping mall in Columbia, Maryland, killing two people and then himself. It is reported that the shooter was also carrying "crude explosives" at the time of the attack. Though authorities originally believed Aguilar had some relationship with the victims, this was later dismissed. January 26 – The price of a first-class mail stamp increases to $0.49. January 28 – President Barack Obama delivers his annual State of the Union Address, focusing on, among other issues, the country's environmental policies, creating jobs and immigration reform, saying he wants 2014 to be a "year of action." Special attention is brought to Obama's willingness to circumvent the decisions of Congress should they not go forward with his plans, which some critics believe would overstep his executive powers and undermine the system of checks and balances.

February

February 1 – The Pro Football Hall of Fame inductees are announced: Walter Jones, Derrick Brooks, Michael Strahan, Andre Reed, Aeneas Williams, Claude Humphrey, and Ray Guy. February 2 – Super Bowl XLVIII is played at MetLife Stadium at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The Seattle Seahawks win their first Super Bowl by defeating the Denver Broncos by a score of 43–8. February 3 – Janet Yellen succeeds Ben Bernanke to become the 15th Chairperson of the Federal Reserve as well as the first woman to hold the position. February 4 Sixteen missing children are rescued from Super Bowl-associated sex-trade slavery in an FBI sting. American science educator and engineer Bill Nye (popularly known as "Bill Nye the Science Guy") defends evolution in the classroom in a debate with creationist Ken Ham on the topic of whether creation is a viable model of origins in the modern, scientific era. February 7 – The Lego Movie is released in theaters. February 7–23 – The United States compete at the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia and win 9 gold, 7 silver, and 12 bronze medals. February 10 – The Obama Administration delays the employer mandate of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act for the second time. February 12 A federal judge rules that Kentucky's ban on recognizing same-sex marriages performed outside the state is unconstitutional but later stays the ruling until March 20. President Obama signs an executive order raising the minimum wage for federal contract workers from $7.25 to $10.10. February 13 A federal judge rules that Virginia's ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional but immediately stays the ruling. A federal judge rules that California's gun law restricting concealed weapons is unconstitutional because it violates the Second Amendment. Comcast buys Time Warner Cable for $45 billion. If approved by the government, the merger will become the largest cable network provider in the nation. The Ivanpah Solar Power Facility opens in the Mojave Desert of California, producing over 392 megawatts of electricity at full capacity and becoming the world's largest solar thermal power plant to date. February 14 – Workers at the Volkswagen Chattanooga Assembly Plant in Tennessee reject unionizing by a vote of 712–626. The result is considered by many media outlets to be a defeat for labor unions in the United States. February 17 The Tonight Show broadcasts its first episode in New York City in nearly 42 years with new host Jimmy Fallon. The nationally televised late-night talk show moved to Los Angeles in 1972. 2014 Olympics: Meryl Davis & Charlie White became the first couple from the USA to win the ice dancing gold. February 19 – A Nebraska judge rules that allowing the governor to directly approve the Keystone XL pipeline and bypass legislative commissions is unconstitutional, further complicating the widely publicized project to connect the Canadian oil sands to the Gulf of Mexico. February 23 – In NASCAR, Dale Earnhardt Jr. eventually wins the Daytona 500, ending a 55-race winless streak in the Sprint Cup Series after the race is red-flagged for several hours due to heavy rain and a tornado warning is put into effect for the area. February 24 – The Obama Administration proposes to significantly reduce the military budget to $522 billion and to shrink the army to a level not seen since the years prior to World War II. February 26 A federal judge rules that Texas's ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional but immediately stays the ruling. Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona vetoes a bill that would have allowed business owners to refuse to serve people who are LGBT based solely on their religious beliefs. February 28 – Seth Meyers takes over as host of Late Night, with his premiere guests Amy Poehler, Vice-President Joe Biden, and A Great Big World. Meyers is the third consecutive Saturday Night Live alumnus (after Jimmy Fallon and Conan O'Brien) to host the show. The show's new bandleader, Fred Armisen, is also an SNL veteran."Inside Seth Meyers' 'Late Night' Debut," from The Hollywood Reporter, February 24, 2014.

March

March 2 – 86th Academy Awards: The ceremony, hosted by Ellen DeGeneres, is held at Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. The telecast garners over 43.7 million viewers, the most-watched Oscar broadcast since 2000. Steve McQueen's 12 Years a Slave wins the Academy Award for Best Picture. The Great Beauty, an Italian film, wins the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity wins seven awards, including the Academy Award for Best Director. The film also co-leads in nominations with ten, next to David O. Russell's American Hustle. Matthew McConaughey wins the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Dallas Buyers Club. Cate Blanchett wins the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Blue Jasmine. Frozen wins the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. March 7 Massachusetts bans the taking of candid upskirt photographs in public. Two days earlier, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court had ruled that the taking of such photographs is legal. Mr. Peabody & Sherman is released in theaters. March 12 – A gas explosion collapses a building in New York City, killing eight people and injuring over 70 others. March 13 At the 2014 South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas, a suspected drunk driver crashes through barricades and drives through a crowd of pedestrians, killing two people and injuring over 20 others. President Obama signs an executive order directed at the Department of Labor to expand its role in regulating overtime pay. March 18 – A television helicopter crashes in Seattle, Washington, killing two people. March 21 – A federal judge rules that Michigan's ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional and does not stay the ruling, although the ruling is later suspended until at least March 26 by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in order to consider an appeal by Michigan's Attorney General. March 22 A mudflow occurs near Oso, Washington, killing 43 people. A barge carrying nearly one million gallons of oil collides with a ship in Galveston Bay off the coast of Texas, causing a fuel oil spill. March 24 Disney announces that it is buying Maker Studios, an internet-video based company, for $500 million. A train derailment of the CTA Blue Line occurs at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois, leaving 32 people injured. March 26 Facebook announces that it is buying Oculus, a firm that specializes in virtual reality displays, for $2 billion. Connecticut passes legislation that will raise its minimum wage from $8.70 to $10.10 by 2017, making it the first state to answer President Obama's call for an increase in the minimum wage. March 28 – The 5.1 La Habra earthquake shakes the Greater Los Angeles Area with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VI (Strong), causing a few injuries and $10.8 million in damage. March 30 – Protests occur in Albuquerque, New Mexico after a video surfaces online of a March 16 fatal confrontation between local police and a homeless man. March 31 – Open enrollment for the first year of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act's health insurance marketplace ends, with the number of enrollees exceeding the Obama Administration's goal of 7 million.

April