In a surprise Bernie Sanders breathed new life into his long shot White House bid with a crucial win in Michigan’s primary, chipping away Hillary Clinton’s dominance in the Democratic presidential race. Ms. Clinton breezed to an easy victory in Mississippi, propelled by overwhelming support from black voters. She now has more than half the delegates she needs to clinch the Democratic nomination at the party’s national convention in July.
The former secretary of state slumped to defeat in the industrial rust belt state of Michigan, where Sanders snagged 49.9% of the vote compared to Clinton’s 48.2% with almost all precincts already reported. “This has been a fantastic night in Michigan,” Sanders said shortly before the race was called in his favour.
Mr. Trump, padded his lead over Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who won the Idaho primary. “I don’t think I’ve had so many horrible, horrible things said about me in one week, $38 million worth of horrible lies,” Trump told a crowd in Florida as he celebrated his first two victories. “I think we ought to use that money to fight Hillary Clinton and the Democrats.”
“They didn’t do so well tonight, folks,” Trump said in a victory speech in Florida, referring to his Republican rivals. “Only one person did well tonight: Donald Trump.” “We’ll take many, many people away from the Democrats,” he said. “We’re seeing that. We had people come over here who have never voted Republican.”
“We are better than what we are being offered by the Republicans,” Ms. Clinton declared.
Mr. Sanders, a self-declared democratic socialist, said Michigan signalled “that we are a national campaign” with wins in different regions of the country. “As more people get to know more about who we are and what our views are we’re going to do very well,” the Vermont senator said in a statement.
Marco Rubio, the senator whom the mainstream Republicans rallied behind as the man to topple Trump, suffered another poor showing, facing the prospect of receiving zero delegates from either Michigan or Mississippi, the two main prizes of the night.
By Premji
