 US Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obamawaves to supporters, as he stands with his wife Michelle, after his speech at his Oregon and Kentucky primary election night rally in Des Moines, Iowa, May 20, 2008. |
"You have put us within reach of the Democratic nomination," he told cheering supporters in Iowa, the overwhelmingly white state that launched him, a black, first-term senator from Illinois, on his improbable path to victory last January.
Obama lavished praise on Hillary Rodham Clinton, his rival in a race unlike any other, and accused Republican John McCain of a campaign run by lobbyists.
"You are Democrats who are tired of being divided, Republicans who no longer recognize the party that runs Washington, independents who are hungry for change," he said, speaking to a crowd on the grounds of the Iowa Capitol in Des Moines as well as the millions around the country who will elect the nation's 44th president in November.
Despite losing Kentucky to Clinton by a margin of 65 percent to 30 percent, Obama picked up at least 14 delegates in the state, she at least 37. That gave him 1,931 out of the 2,026 needed. The former first lady has 1,755 in their marathon race-- a black man running against a woman-- that has shattered voter turnout records in state after state.
The two rivals also collided in Oregon's unique vote-by-mail primary.
Obama said the night's contests gave him a majority of the delegates elected in all 56 primaries and caucuses combined-- as distinct from nearly 800 superdelegates who hold the balance of power at the convention.
"We still have work to do to in the remaining states, where we will compete for every delegate available," he said in an e-mail sent to supporters."But tonight, I want to thank you for everything you have done to take us this far-- farther than anyone predicted, expected or even believed possible."
Clinton, the one-time front-runner in the race, said she was in it still.
"This is one of the closest races for a party's nomination in modern history," the former first lady told supporters celebrating her Kentucky victory."We're winning the popular vote," she said, despite figures from competitive contests that show otherwise."I'm more determined than ever to see that every vote is cast and every ballot is counted."
Even so, she commended Obama, adding,"while we continue to go toe-to-toe for this nomination, we do see eye-to-eye when it comes to uniting our party to elect a Democratic president this fall."
She also said Michigan and Florida Democrats deserve to have their votes counted, a reference to the lingering controversy surrounding primaries in both states held in defiance of Democratic National Committee rules.
Party officials are scheduled to meet later this month to consider how-- or whether-- to seat all or part of the states' delegates.
Obama's speech was part a summons to the voters to embrace change, part attempt to coax Clinton's supporters to his side as the nominating contest draws to a close.
"We have had our disagreements during this campaign, but we all admire her courage, her commitment and her perseverance," he said."No matter how this primary ends, Senator Clinton has shattered myths and broken barriers and changed the America in which my daughters and yours will come of age." As for McCain, he said he would leave it up to the Arizona senator"to explain whether his policies and positions represent long-held convictions or Washington calculations, but the one thing they don't represent is change."
 Hillary Clinton arrives for a campaign stop in Louisville, Kentucky. Barack Obama claimed he had piled up a'milestone' majority of elected delegates in the Democratic White House race, despite Clinton's thumping win in the first of Tuesday's two primary votes. |
The exit poll in Kentucky underscored once more the work Obama has ahead if he is to win over Clinton's supporters.
Almost nine in 10 ballots were cast by whites, and the former first lady was winning their support overwhelmingly. She defeated her rival among voters of all age groups and incomes, the college educated and non-college educated, self-described liberals, moderates and conservatives.
Though Clinton has had a strong run through the late primaries, Obama has steadily outpaced her where it counts, in the race for national convention delegates.
With her Kentucky victory, Clinton picked up at least 37 delegates to at least 14 for Obama.
Overall, Obama had 1,931 delegates, less than 100 shy of the 2,026 needed to become the first black presidential nominee of a major party. The former first lady had 1,759.
Both candidates paused during the day to express best wishes to Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat suffering from a brain tumor.
"So many of us here have benefited in some way or another because of the battles he's waged, and some of us are here because of them," Obama said.
Said Clinton:"As a lifelong champion for social justice and equality, his work has made the path easier for me, for Senator Obama and for countless others. He's been with us for our fights and we're now with him in his."
Regardless of the results of the two primaries, Obama was moving ahead on the assumption he would soon become the nominee. Party officials said discussions were under way to send Paul Tewes, a top Obama campaign aide, to the Democratic National Committee to oversee operations for the fall campaign.
Obama decided to mark a victory of sorts-- a majority of pledged delegates from state primaries and caucuses-- with his evening appearance in Iowa, site of his critical Jan. 3 caucus triumph that launched him on his way through the primaries that followed.
"The question then becomes how do we complete the nomination process so that we have the majority of the total number of delegates, including superdelegates, to be able to say this thing's over," Obama told The Associated Press in an interview.
Clinton looked for a consolation for the strongest presidential campaign of any woman in history. She hoped to finish with more votes than her rival in all the contests combined, including Florida and Michigan, two states that were stripped of their delegates by the national party for moving their primary dates too early.
Not counting the results in Kentucky and Oregon, Obama was ahead of Clinton by slightly more than 618,000 votes out of 32.2 million cast in primaries and caucuses where both candidates competed.
The numbers do not include Iowa, Maine, or Nevada caucuses, nor do they count-- as Clinton does in her totals-- Florida and Michigan.
Oregon, where Obama drew a crowd estimated by police at 75,000 over the weekend, had 52 delegates at stake. The state also had the distinction of staging the only contest without a designated polling day. Instead, under a vote-by-mail system, election officials tallied all ballots received by 11 pm EDT on primary day.
The only primaries remaining are Puerto Rico, on June 1, followed two days later by South Dakota and Montana.
Increasingly, Obama has been concentrating his campaign on McCain, the Republican nominee-in-waiting, rather than on Clinton.
The former first lady, too, has jettisoned the sharp attacks against Obama that characterized the race only a few weeks ago, although she bristled on Monday at his decision to focus on the fall campaign."You can declare yourself anything, but if you don't have the votes, it doesn't matter," she said in an interview with an Oregon television station.
There was no shortage of signs that the closest Democratic nominating campaign in a generation was reaching its final stages after drawing more than 33 million voters to the polls and shattering numerous turnout records along the way.
