LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Sen. Barack Obama stepped to the brink of victory in the Democratic presidential race Tuesday night, projected to win Oregon and despite a lopsided loss in the Kentucky primary, moving within 100 delegates of the total needed to claim the prize at the party convention this summer.
“You have put us within reach of the Democratic nomination,” he told cheering supporters in Iowa, the state that launched the first-term senator from Illinois on his improbable path to victory last January.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton won at least 54 delegates in the two states and Obama won at least 39, according to an analysis of election returns by the Associated Press. All the Kentucky delegates were awarded, but there were still 10 of 52 to be allocated in Oregon.
Obama had 1,956 delegates overall, out of 2,026 needed for the nomination. Clinton had 1,776 according the latest tally by the AP.
With 75 percent of precincts reporting in Oregon, where polls closed at 8 p.m., Obama had 58 percent of the vote to Clinton’s 42 percent.
Clinton took Kentucky by a margin of 65 percent to 30 percent.
Obama said the night’s contests gave him a majority of the pledged delegates elected in all 56 primaries and caucuses combined — as distinct from nearly 800 unpledged “superdelegates” who hold the balance of power at the convention.
Obama lavished praise on Clinton, and accused Republican Sen. 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.
“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,” Clinton 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.
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