Even as he touts his efforts to put more Americans to work, President Barack Obama faces a public increasingly skeptical of his ability to bring jobs back to Main Street.

During stops in Iowa, Illinois and Missouri, Obama will try to convince voters that his economic policies are working, despite an unemployment rate that’s expected to remain at painfully high levels for months if not years.

 With high unemployment, Obama’s claims of recovery fall on deaf ears

Those voters – many of them crucial independents – will be key to Obama’s re-election prospects in 2012. And his fellow Democrats, facing a tough political climate in the November, need their support even sooner.

"The bottom line is that the Democrats are almost certain to be campaigning in economic circumstances that will not be politically favorable," said William Galston, a former domestic policy aide in Bill Clinton’s White House and now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Read More: By JULIE PACE, Associated Press