A simple Google search prior to voting for him would have sufficed.

(USA Today) — President Obama is lagging behind Republicans in the chase for political moderate voters in 12 battleground states, according to a new poll by the centrist Democratic group Third Way.

About 59% of “switchers,” voters who backed Obama in 2008 but voted for a Republican in the midterm elections, say the president’s party is more liberal than they are and that their political views align more closely with Republicans. Among the 400 switchers polled, 16% said they would vote for Obama again; 25% said they would back the Republican nominee; and 59% were categorized as “persuadable switchers.”

“The problem is that they don’t see Obama and Democrats in their (ideological) neighborhood,” Jim Kessler, vice president for policy at Third Way, said of the switchers. “But we feel it’s possible for Democrats to move themselves along the continuum to a center direction.”

Democrats were drubbed at the polls last November, with independents favoring Republicans 55% to 39% in House races; Obama won the independent vote by 8 percentage points in 2008.

For Obama to win re-election, he will need to persuade a large number of voters who switched allegiances in the midterm elections to return to the fold, according to Third Way. Yet the poll of voters in 12 battleground states suggests that Obama is on shaky ground with swing voters. The results of the poll, conducted by Lincoln Park Strategies, were shared with USA TODAY ahead of today’s release.