White House race wide open as upstarts rattle Trump, Clinton

Ted Cruz, the firebrand Texas senator, has won Iowa’s Republican caucus, as Hillary Clinton secured the narrowest of victories over Democratic rival Bernie Sanders in the first votes of the 2016 presidential campaign.

The Iowa Democratic Party said Tuesday that it would not do any recount of the close results, and a spokesman for the Sanders campaign said it does not intend to challenge the results of the caucuses – in a race the Iowa Democratic Party called the closest in its caucus history.

Republican candidate Donald Trump heaped scorn on the reactions to his performance in the Iowa Caucus.

“Tonight is a victory for courageous conservatives across Iowa and all across this great nation”, said Cruz, after Iowans flocked to churches, school gymnasiums and libraries to cast the first votes in the boisterous USA presidential nominating process. Rubio finished so well that, with another day of campaigning in Iowa – or a few million dollars less in Right to Rise attack ads – he might have actually nudged past Trump for second place. Democrats were girding for a protracted slugfest between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, locked in a virtual tie.

Rallying supporters in Nashua, she urged voters to get practical and ask themselves when they hear candidates’ promises, “Does this just sound good on paper or does this get done?” But when each candidate’s preference group was counted, Clinton had 240 supporters, Sanders had 179 and Martin O’Malley had five (causing him to be declared non-viable).

New Hampshire’s primary elections are set for next Tuesday.

“We are continuing to negotiate with them not just about the debate Thursday night, but about the other debates that we have said need to be agreed to in order to put the whole package of debates together”, Tad Devine, a top Sanders campaign official, told The Hill.

It takes 2,382 delegates to win the Democratic nomination for president.

Meanwhile, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s stronger-than-expected third place finish was helped in large part by late deciders.

The heavy favorite to win the nomination even before she announced her candidacy last summer, she faced increasing opposition throughout the fall and winter from Sanders, who appealed to younger and more liberal members of the party.

The remaining candidates are now in New Hampshire, the next state to hold a primary vote, where Mr Trump is leading in the polls.

“I am alive!” Above, Donald Trump speaks to supporters in West Des Moines, Iowa, on February 1, 2016.

The Clinton campaign issued a statement early Tuesday declaring victory, saying, “Statistically, there is no outstanding information that could change the results and no way that Senator Sanders can overcome Secretary Clinton’s advantage”.

Iowa’s caucuses results were a bit shocking for many, as reported by Fox News Latino.

Although Clinton said she was “breathing a big sigh of relief”, and her campaign said it had won an outright victory, the neck-and-neck contest was a blow, evoking the setback she faced in 2008 after her upset loss to then-Sen. “New Hampshire – we love New Hampshire”, Trump said Monday night as he conceded to Cruz at his Election Night party in Des Moines. Having run a textbook Iowa campaign targeting rural and evangelical voters, Cruz faced a steeper climb in New Hampshire, with its tradition of favoring more mainstream candidates. Trump’s reality distortion field proved even more powerful than the polls, and it may yet prove more powerful than the Iowa caucuses.

“And New Hampshire’s gonna have to decide who can go toe to toe with the Republicans to make sure they don’t wreck us again!” she exclaimed. None of the other Republicans, including former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Ohio Governor John Kasich, polled above 3 percent.