(CNN) Hillary Clinton, a woman who has lived in the public eye for the better part of three decades, is looking to write the latest chapter of her life by doing what she failed to do in 2008: win the presidency.
Clinton's life has seen the former first lady go from a child raised in a conservative home outside Chicago to one of the most recognizable women in the world.
She became a household name in 1992 when her husband, Bill Clinton, won the presidency. Since then, Hillary Clinton has become a political force in her own right, serving in the Senate for eight years, unsuccessfully running for President in 2008 and leading the State Department from 2009 to 2013.
Clinton's latest run at the presidency has been widely anticipated for years and much of the Democratic Party's infrastructure has already lined up behind her. Even before Clinton left the State Department in early 2013, speculation that she would take another shot at the White House followed her.
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For her part, Clinton willingly teased those expectations for the better part of the last two years as she crisscrossed the country delivering paid speeches, selling a new memoir and stumping for Democrats during the 2014 midterm elections.
Clinton officially launched her presidential campaign in April 2015 with a slickly produced video.
"I'm running for president," Clinton said in the video. "Everyday Americans need a champion, and I want to be that champion -- so you can do more than just get by -- you can get ahead."
Clinton, the first to enter the Democratic presidential field, came into the race as the prohibitive favorite for the nomination.
Months removed from her announcement, Clinton's victory looks far less certain.
From Chicago to Washington
Hillary Clinton was born in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up in Park Ridge, a middle-class, primarily white suburb.
Clinton was brought up in a split household. Her father, Hugh Rodham, a small businessman known for being strict, was a conservative Republican, while her mother, Dorothy, was a Democrat.
"She embraced her mother's politics and never got over her father's hard-headedness," Bill Clinton is fond of saying.
Clinton's involvement in youth programs at First Methodist Church in Park Ridge defined her upbringing and, to many people close to her, shaped her into the person she has become today. Don Jones, a Methodist youth pastor, exposed Clinton to inequality in urban Chicago, introduced her to other ways of thinking and even introduced her to Martin Luther King Jr.
While Clinton volunteered on the presidential campaign of Republican candidate Barry Goldwater in 1964, she soon became a Democrat after enrolling in Wellesley College. Clinton campaigned for insurgent Democrat Eugene McCarthy in 1968 and by the time she graduated in Yale University Law School in 1973, Clinton was a full-fledged Democrat who went on to work for the Children's Defense Fund and on the committee looking to impeach President Richard Nixon.
Hillary Clinton's life in the spotlight
Hillary Clinton accepts the Democratic Party's nomination for president at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia on July 28, 2016. The former first lady, U.S. senator and secretary of state was the first woman to lead the presidential ticket of a major political party.
Before marrying Bill Clinton, she was Hillary Rodham. Here she attends Wellesley College in Massachusetts. Her commencement speech at Wellesley's graduation ceremony in 1969 attracted national attention. After graduating, she attended Yale Law School.
Rodham was a lawyer on the House Judiciary Committee, whose work led to impeachment charges against President Richard Nixon in 1974.
In 1975, Rodham married Bill Clinton, whom she met at Yale Law School. He became the governor of Arkansas in 1978. In 1980, the couple had a daughter, Chelsea.
Arkansas' first lady, now using the name Hillary Rodham Clinton, wears her inaugural ball gown in 1985.
The Clintons celebrate Bill's inauguration in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1991. He was governor from 1983 to 1992, when he was elected President.
Bill Clinton comforts his wife on the set of "60 Minutes" after a stage light broke loose from the ceiling and knocked her down in January 1992.
In June 1992, Clinton uses a sewing machine designed to eliminate back and wrist strain. She had just given a speech at a convention of the International Ladies' Garment Workers Union.
During the 1992 presidential campaign, Clinton jokes with her husband's running mate, Al Gore, and Gore's wife, Tipper, aboard a campaign bus.
Clinton accompanies her husband as he takes the oath of office in January 1993.
The Clintons share a laugh on Capitol Hill in 1993.
Clinton unveils the renovated Blue Room of the White House in 1995.
Clinton waves to the media in January 1996 as she arrives for an appearance before a grand jury in Washington. The first lady was subpoenaed to testify as a witness in the investigation of the Whitewater land deal in Arkansas. The Clintons' business investment was investigated, but ultimately they were cleared of any wrongdoing.
The Clintons hug as Bill is sworn in for a second term as President.
The first lady holds up a Grammy Award, which she won for her audiobook "It Takes a Village" in 1997.
The Clintons dance on a beach in the U.S. Virgin Islands in January 1998. Later that month, Bill Clinton was accused of having a sexual relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
Clinton looks on as her husband discusses the Monica Lewinsky scandal in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on January 26, 1998. Clinton declared, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman." In August of that year, Clinton testified before a grand jury and admitted to having "inappropriate intimate contact" with Lewinsky, but he said it did not constitute sexual relations because they had not had intercourse. He was impeached in December on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.
The first family walks with their dog, Buddy, as they leave the White House for a vacation in August 1998.
President Clinton makes a statement at the White House in December 1998, thanking members of Congress who voted against his impeachment. The Senate trial ended with an acquittal in February 1999.
Clinton announces in February 2000 that she will seek the U.S. Senate seat in New York. She was elected later that year.
Clinton makes her first appearance on the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee.
Sen. Clinton comforts Maren Sarkarat, a woman who lost her husband in the September 11 terrorist attacks, during a ground-zero memorial in October 2001.
Clinton holds up her book "Living History" before a signing in Auburn Hills, Michigan, in 2003.
Clinton and another presidential hopeful, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, applaud at the start of a Democratic debate in 2007.
Obama and Clinton talk on the plane on their way to a rally in Unity, New Hampshire, in June 2008. She had recently ended her presidential campaign and endorsed Obama.
Obama is flanked by Clinton and Vice President-elect Joe Biden at a news conference in Chicago in December 2008. He had designated Clinton to be his secretary of state.
Clinton, as secretary of state, greets Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin during a meeting just outside Moscow in March 2010.
The Clintons pose on the day of Chelsea's wedding to Marc Mezvinsky in July 2010.
In this photo provided by the White House, Obama, Clinton, Biden and other members of the national security team receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in May 2011.
Clinton checks her Blackberry inside a military plane after leaving Malta in October 2011. In 2015, The New York Times reported that Clinton exclusively used a personal email account during her time as secretary of state. The account, fed through its own server, raises security and preservation concerns. Clinton later said she used a private domain out of "convenience," but admits in retrospect "it would have been better" to use multiple emails.
Clinton arrives for a group photo before a forum with the Gulf Cooperation Council in March 2012. The forum was held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Obama and Clinton bow during the transfer-of-remains ceremony marking the return of four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, who were killed in Benghazi, Libya, in September 2012.
Clinton ducks after a woman threw a shoe at her while she was delivering remarks at a recycling trade conference in Las Vegas in 2014.
Clinton, now running for President again, performs with Jimmy Fallon during a "Tonight Show" skit in September 2015.
Clinton testifies about the Benghazi attack during a House committee meeting in October 2015. "I would imagine I have thought more about what happened than all of you put together," she said during the 11-hour hearing. "I have lost more sleep than all of you put together. I have been wracking my brain about what more could have been done or should have been done." Months earlier, Clinton had acknowledged a "systemic breakdown" as cited by an Accountability Review Board, and she said that her department was taking additional steps to increase security at U.S. diplomatic facilities.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders shares a lighthearted moment with Clinton during a Democratic presidential debate in October 2015. It came after Sanders gave his take on the Clinton email scandal. "The American people are sick and tired of hearing about the damn emails," Sanders said. "Enough of the emails. Let's talk about the real issues facing the United States of America."
Clinton is reflected in a teleprompter during a campaign rally in Alexandria, Virginia, in October 2015.
Clinton walks on her stage with her family after winning the New York primary in April.
After Clinton became the Democratic Party's presumptive nominee, this photo was posted to her official Twitter account. "To every little girl who dreams big: Yes, you can be anything you want -- even president," Clinton said. "Tonight is for you."
Obama hugs Clinton after he gave a speech at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. The president said Clinton was ready to be commander in chief. "For four years, I had a front-row seat to her intelligence, her judgment and her discipline," he said, referring to her stint as his secretary of state.
Clinton arrives at a 9/11 commemoration ceremony in New York on September 11. Clinton, who was diagnosed with pneumonia two days before, left early after feeling ill. A video
appeared to show her stumble as Secret Service agents helped her into a van.
Clinton addresses a campaign rally in Cleveland on November 6, two days before Election Day. She went on to lose Ohio -- and the election -- to her Republican opponent, Donald Trump.
After conceding the presidency to Trump in a phone call earlier,
Clinton addresses supporters and campaign workers in New York on Wednesday, November 9. Her defeat marked a stunning end to a campaign that appeared poised to make her the first woman elected US president.
Clinton consequentially decided to move to Arkansas in 1974, following her then-boyfriend Bill Clinton -- the pair met as Yale Law students. The couple married in 1975, and so began the life of what would become one of the most prominent families in Democratic politics.
Bill Clinton was elected governor of Arkansas in 1978. Hillary Clinton continued working at Rose Law Firm, making her the initial first lady of Arkansas to hold a job while her husband was governor.
When Bill Clinton won the presidency in 1992, Hillary Clinton took a more involved role in the White House than was typical for a first lady, for which she was at times criticized. Bill Clinton named her to lead his Task Force on National Health Care Reform, a plan that would soon earn the moniker Hillary-care. The health care reform was blocked in Congress, a defeat the still stings Clinton.
"It is not whether you get knocked down, it is whether you get back up," Clinton said in January. "And I have gotten back up time and time and time again because I believe that we all have an opportunity to try to keep going and to help others along the way."
From senator to secretary
Clinton launched her own political career in 2000 when she announced her candidacy for the United States Senate, something she still says she never thought would happen. She would go on to win that race and subsequent reelection in 2006.
While in the Senate, Clinton released her memoir "Living History," a book that delved into some of the more sensitive points in Clinton's life, including her husband's affair with Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern. The scandal almost sunk Bill Clinton's presidency.
When she entered the 2008 presidential race, as was the case eight years later, Clinton was widely considered her party's frontrunner.
But Clinton's campaign never lived up to the hype. She suffered a stinging loss in Iowa, the-first-in-the-nation caucus, actually finishing third. She bounced back with a win in New Hampshire days later. But the Granite State was the high point of her campaign, an operation defined by some internal dysfunction, staff turnovers and failure to meet expectations.
Clinton formally suspended her presidential campaign in June and endorsed then-Sen. Barack Obama.
"Although we weren't able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it's got about 18 million cracks in it," Clinton told her supporters.
Obama would go on to win the presidency, with help from Clinton, his former rival. After winning, Obama named Clinton to the top diplomatic post -- secretary of state -- and the former first lady was confirmed in 2009.
While Clinton traveled almost 1 million miles as secretary of state, her tenure has been overshadowed at times by the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, where four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, were killed. Clinton has taken responsibility for the deaths, but Republicans -- with some success -- have sought to seize on the issue to score political points.
Fighting to win
Much like in 2008, Clinton entered 2016 as the prohibitive favorite for the Democratic nomination.
Although Clinton has been in the public eye for three decades, Clinton's friends affectionately refer to the former first lady, senator and secretary of state as "one of the most unknown well-known people" in the world.
Clinton aides looked to rectify that at the start of the campaign, holding small events where she could talk to "everyday Americans" and show a softer side.
But after a handful of stumbles and with nagging questions and inquiries into her use of a private email server as secretary of state, Clinton finds herself in a tighter-than-expected race with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders for the nomination.
Several Democrats close to the campaign, particularly in Bill Clinton's orbit and among donors, have acknowledged discontent within the operation and feel the campaign was too slow to recognize the threat posed by the Vermont senator.
Sanders has harnessed anger among the liberal base and has used his substantial online fundraising prowess to fund an upstart campaign that has exceeded even his expectations.
Clinton, for her part, has tried to stress her progressive credentials and her record of delivering results.