Print

Email story

Comment

Letter to the editor

Politics

3 wins put Obama ahead in delegates

McCain extends lead with sweep of Tuesday's Potomac contests.

By Wes Allison, Times Staff Writer
Published February 13, 2008

WASHINGTON - Sen. Barack Obama proved he can expand his appeal beyond the groups that have buoyed him so far, sweeping the three-way Potomac Primary on Tuesday and taking a new lead over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in delegates for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Among Republicans, Sen. John McCain found that he has failed to convince conservative voters that he's their guy, only narrowly beating former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Virginia despite being his party's presumptive presidential nominee. He also won Maryland and the District of Columbia.

The McCain campaign congratulated Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, on his strong showing in Virginia and vowed to work to unite the party in time for the November election.

"As I have done my entire career, I will make my case to every American who will listen. I will not confine myself to the comfort of speaking only to those who agree with me," McCain said. "I will make my case to all the people. I will listen to those who disagree. I will attempt to persuade them ... and I will learn from them."

But the real race was among the Democrats. Clinton, a senator from New York and former first lady, and Obama, of Illinois, are locked in a tight brawl for delegates expected to last until the April 22 Pennsylvania primary or beyond.

As of 11 p.m. Tuesday, Obama had 1,210 delegates to Clinton's 1,188, according to the Associated Press. It was Obama's first lead since the campaign started. It takes 2,025 delegates to win the Democratic nomination, including those awarded by caucus or primary and those "superdelegates" - elected Democrats and party pooh-bahs - who can support whomever they like.

Obama enters the next round of voting in delegate-rich states - namely Wisconsin, Ohio and Texas - with a surge of momentum after sweeping four states over the weekend.

"Today, the change we seek swept through the Chesapeake and over the Potomac," Obama told a cheering crowd in Madison, Wis. "Tonight we're on our way. But we know how much further we have to go. We know it takes more than one night, or even one election, to overcome decades of money and influence ... This moment, the cynics can no longer say that our hope isn't valid.

"We have now won east and west, north and south, and across the heartland of this country we love."

While Clinton had not expected to prevail Tuesday, Obama's large margins of victory in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia chewed into Clinton's traditional base of support and showed he can reach beyond the African-Americans and professional, relatively affluent white Democrats who have carried him in recent elections.

In Virginia, for instance, Obama almost tied Clinton among white voters, with whom she had largely prevailed before, especially in the South, according to exit polls conducted for the Associated Press.

Obama also bested Clinton among women by roughly 16 percentage points, a stunning turnabout, and won nine of 10 black voters.

Clinton had enjoyed a slim majority of women in previous contests, while Obama had enjoyed support from a smaller majority of men than he won on Tuesday.

For the Republicans, the Associated Press count showed McCain with 729 delegates; he added another 63 Tuesday night for winning Virginia, 37 for Maryland and 16 for the District of Columbia.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who dropped out of the race last week, had 288. Huckabee had 241, and Texas Rep. Ron Paul had 14. The winner will need 1,191, making it virtually impossible for Huckabee to catch McCain.

But Huckabee has vowed to stay in the race, and the more delegates he wins, the more sway he'll have with his party when the Republicans hold their nominating convention this summer.

McCain's close call in Virginia, where he was winning with just 50 percent of the vote late Tuesday night, proves what many conservatives have been saying since Romney quit last week: Just because McCain is the likely nominee doesn't mean the party's conservative base is ready to embrace him.

While McCain easily won among urban and suburban voters in Virginia, the biggest prize of the night, he was clobbered in rural, conservative counties from the Shenandoah Valley to the North Carolina line.

This rebuke from social conservatives, who voted overwhelmingly for Huckabee, according to exit polls, came despite a recent charm offensive by McCain and endorsements by several conservative luminaries, including former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, former Virginia Sen. George Allen and President Bush.

McCain has clashed with conservatives on tax cuts, campaign finance reform, immigration and other issues and has acknowledged he will need their enthusiasm and shoe leather to win the White House in November.

"He hasn't closed the deal with conservatives, and while I don't think (Virginia's result) necessarily improves Huckabee's chances, it doesn't improve McCain's narrative," said Jennifer Duffy, editor of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. "Does he walk into a general election with this perception that he split his own party?"

Tuesday night's results were far more resounding for Obama. In a region where Obama drew thousands to his campaign events, and where an unannounced visit to a Dunkin' Donuts on Tuesday morning stopped traffic on Capitol Hill and morphed into an impromptu rally as scores of passers-by flocked to see him, supporters said they believed his resounding win gave him important momentum in the upcoming races.

Consider this: With 92 percent of precincts reporting in Virginia, Obama had received 102,000 more votes than all the Republican candidates combined.

"What is most exciting is that he's a candidate who looks and sounds like everything grandmother talked about: equality, getting a good job, being successful," said Peter Bug Matthews, 57, a cobbler in Washington who voted for Obama, and who was a delegate for Jesse Jackson in 1984.

"Folks you know who are down and out have some hope. They can be part of this. He brings hope to people."

As the polls closed, Clinton and Obama both were looking ahead.

Clinton addressed supporters in El Paso, Texas, but did not mention Tuesday's primaries. Instead, she delivered a standard stump speech and stuck to her theme that she alone has the experience to be president.

"I am a problem solver," she said. "I believe that we need a president, starting on Day 1, who's going to roll up his or her sleeves and get to work."

Obama, meanwhile, was in Wisconsin, which votes Tuesday. An overwhelmingly white state with loads of working class and rural voters, Wisconsin ostensibly could be competitive for Clinton, but it's unclear how aggressively she's planning to target it.

Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said Tuesday that the lead that Obama is building in delegates is more important than momentum.

"I don't think it's so much about momentum as it is about the reality of the math," Plouffe said. "We have a healthy pledged delegate lead right now, and we intend to grow it and build on it."

Times political editor Adam Smith contributed to this report. Wes Allison can be reached at allison@sptimes.com or (202) 463-0577.

[Last modified February 13, 2008, 00:09:22]