1972 United States presidential election

==Aftermath==
{{Main|Watergate scandal}}
On June 17, 1972, five months before election day, five men broke into the [[Democratic National Committee]] headquarters at the [[Watergate hotel]] in Washington, D. C.; the resulting investigation led to the revelation of attempted cover-ups of the break-in within the Nixon administration. What became known as the [[Watergate scandal]] eroded President Nixon's public and political support in his second term, and he resigned on August 9, 1974, in the face of probable [[Federal impeachment in the United States|impeachment]] by the House of Representatives and removal from office by the Senate.

As part of the continuing Watergate investigation in 1974–1975, federal prosecutors offered companies that had given illegal campaign contributions to President Nixon's re-election campaign lenient sentences if they came forward.<ref name="'70s">{{cite book|title= How We Got Here: The '70s|last= Frum|first= David|author-link= David Frum|year= 2000|publisher= Basic Books|location= New York, New York|isbn= 0-465-04195-7|page= [https://archive.org/details/howwegothere70sd00frum/page/31 31]|url= https://archive.org/details/howwegothere70sd00frum/page/31}}</ref> Many companies complied, including [[Northrop Grumman]], [[3M]], [[American Airlines]], and [[Braniff Airlines]].<ref name="'70s"/> By 1976, prosecutors had convicted 18 American corporations of contributing illegally to Nixon's campaign.<ref name="'70s"/>

Despite this election delivering Nixon's greatest electoral triumph, Nixon later wrote in his memoirs that "it was one of the most frustrating and in many ways the least satisfying of all".<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nixonfoundation.org/2009/11/my-morris-moment/|title=My Morris Moment »|first=David|last=Emig|date=November 7, 2009|access-date=March 29, 2021|archive-date=April 18, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230418145324/https://www.nixonfoundation.org/2009/11/my-morris-moment/|url-status=live}}</ref>