Barack Obama on Saturday night comfortably won caucuses in the western US state of Wyoming, as the Illinois senator sought to regain momentum in the race for the Democratic nomination after defeats to rival Hillary Clinton in Texas and Ohio last week.
Barack Obama on Saturday night comfortably won caucuses in the western US state of Wyoming, as the Illinois senator sought to regain momentum in the race for the Democratic nomination after defeats to rival Hillary Clinton in Texas and Ohio last week.
Mr Obama clinched 59 per cent of the vote in Wyoming, against 40 per cent for Mrs Clinton, with 96 per cent of precincts reporting. Both candidates had campaigned in Wyoming ahead of Saturday’s caucuses, the latest contest in the increasingly bitter battle to face Republican John McCain in the US presidential election in November.
The caucuses in Wyoming, which is sparsely populated and only sends 12 delegates to the Democratic nominating convention, were the first since Mrs Clinton won key races in Texas and Ohio last week, reversing a string of 11 consecutive losses and breathing fresh life into her campaign.
Mr Obama was heavily favoured to win the Wyoming caucuses, after he had clinched easy victories in several neighboring states, including Colorado, Utah, Idaho and Nebraska.
But there were fears among his supporters that the unexpected weaknesses displayed in Texas and Ohio may carry through to the next contests. In addition, Mr Obama’s campaign suffered a big blow on Friday when Samantha Power, one of his top foreign policy advisers, resigned after calling Mrs Clinton a “monster” in an off-the-record comment to The Scotsman newspaper.
According to US media projections, Mr Obama will emerge from the Wyoming caucuses with at least 7 delegates, while Mrs Clinton is set to gain at least 4, with one undecided. A further six super-delegates have been assigned to Wyoming, all of whom have indicated support for Mr Obama.
Overall, Mr Obama leads the delegate count, with 1,527, against 1,428 for Mrs Clinton. More than 2,000 delegates are needed to clinch the nomination, and with few primaries and caucuses left, there has been increasing speculation that the winner would have to be chosen at a “brokered” convention.
Campaigning for his wife in Mississippi, where the next contest will be held on Tuesday, Bill Clinton, former US president, said a joint ticket including Mrs Clinton and Mr Obama would be an “unstoppable force”.
“He would win the urban areas and the upscale voters, and she wins the traditional rural areas that we lost when President Reagan was president,” Mr Clinton said. “If you put those two things together, you’d have an almost unstoppable force.”
After Mississippi votes on Tuesday, in a state that favours Mr Obama because of its large African-American electorate, the next primary and the largest prize of the remaining contests will be in Pennsylvania on April 22. This state closely mirrors the demographic profile of Ohio, where Mrs Clinton benefited from strong support from blue-collar workers.
By James Politi in Washington
