Clinton Wins Puerto Rico's Democratic Presidential Primary


Clinton Wins Puerto Rico's Democratic Presidential Primary

TEHRAN (Tasnim) – US presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, overwhelmed rival Bernie Sanders in Puerto Rico's Democratic presidential primary, putting her within striking distance of capturing her party's nomination.

After a blowout victory in the US Virgin Islands and a decisive win in the US territory, Clinton is now less than 30 delegates short of the 2,383 needed to win the nomination, according to an Associated Press count on Monday.

"We just won Puerto Rico! Gracias a la Isla del Encanto por esta victoria!" tweeted Clinton, thanking the Island of Enchantment, as Puerto Rico is known, for her victory. As the race was called, Clinton was on stage in Sacramento, rallying voters in California.

The results were slow to arrive on Sunday, as officials counted ballots by hand and focused first on releasing results tied to the island's local primary elections, said Kenneth McClintock, Puerto Rico's former Democratic National Committeeman.

As the results from Puerto Rico trickled in, Clinton maintained a healthy lead over Sanders.

While Puerto Rican residents cannot vote in the general election, the island's politics could reverberate into the fall campaign. Tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans have left the island to escape a dismal economy, with many resettling in the key electoral battleground of Florida.

Like Clinton, Sanders made little mention of the outcome in Puerto Rico's primary. He said during an evening rally in San Diego that Democratic leaders should take notice that the "energy and grassroots activism" that will be crucial to the party in the fall "is with us, not Hillary Clinton."

He pointed to polls showing him faring better than Clinton in head-to-head matchups with Trump and his strength among Democratic voters under the age of 45.

"If the Democratic leadership wants a campaign that will not only retain the White House but regain the Senate and win governors' chairs all across this country, we are that campaign," he said.

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