Clinton and Edwards scramble for second in Democrats’ first southern primary. Obama wins crushing victory in S.C.

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama scored an overwhelming victory in the South Carolina Democratic primary Saturday, giving his historic campaign new momentum as the delegate-rich Super Tuesday states loom on Feb. 5.

New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton was second with more than 90 percent of the vote counted, followed by former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards — a South Carolina native — in third.


Seemingly buoyed by a huge African-American turnout — exit polls indicated at least half those voting were black — Obama posted his second primary win, capping a bruising week of campaigning that found him squarely in the sights of former President Bill Clinton, his opponent's husband and chief surrogate in the Palmetto State.

Obama cast the victory as a sweet vindication of his early win in Iowa and more evidence that he can unite a new Democratic coalition.

"Tonight, the cynics who believed that what began in the snows of Iowa was just an illusion were told a different story by the good people of South Carolina," Obama told his cheering supporters in Columbia, S.C. "After four great contests in every corner of this country, we have the most votes, the most delegates, and the most diverse coalition of Americans we've seen in a long, long time."

Of the 45 South Carolina delegates up for grabs, Obama has won at least 19, with 15 delegates still to be awarded. Clinton has won at least nine delegates and Edwards has won at least two.

Exit polls showed about half of those who voted said Bill Clinton’s campaign tactics were very important to their choice — and many will read the size of Obama's victory as a direct repudiation of the former president.

Obama's "South Carolina voters rejected the politics of the past," said Robert Gibbs, a spokesman for Obama.

At a rally in Missouri on Saturday night, Bill Clinton congratulated Obama, saying he "won fair and square."

After losing to Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire and Nevada (though he won more delegates), Obama desperately needed a South Carolina win to try to rekindle the magic of his Iowa victory and also to prove the conventional wisdom that he could be a formidable presence in states with large African-American populations.

According to exit poll data, Obama appeared to win by a staggering margin among black voters: Four out of five said they voted for him. Obama won a quarter of the white vote, with Clinton and Edwards splitting the rest.

Obama had tried to downplay the issue of race, however, as late polls showed his share of the white vote in South Carolina getting slimmer as his numbers among African-Americans rose.

“We have the largest percentage of Americans we've ever had who are literally aching to live in a post-racial future,” he said in Spartanburg, S.C., Friday. People's backgrounds are important, he said, and we "celebrate them but believe that our common humanity matters more."

The Clinton campaign had tried to lower expectations for South Carolina for days — a strategy made more explicit by her decision to fly to Tennessee, one of the Feb. 5 states.

"I have called Sen. Obama to congratulate him and wish him well," Clinton said in a statement. “We now turn our attention to the millions of Americans who will make their voices heard in Florida and the 22 states as well as American Samoa who will vote on Feb. 5.

For Edwards, the contest in his home state — where, as he notes, people talk like him — was perhaps a final chance to redefine a race that has largely become a head-to-head between Clinton and Obama in recent weeks.

The Edwards campaign on Friday launched both radio and television ads that focused on the “personal attacks” being traded between Obama and Clinton and that tried to cast him as the “grown-up" who is more concerned about issues than “this kind of squabbling.”

On Saturday, as voters went to the polls, Edwards said his campaign had been energized in South Carolina in recent days because Clinton and Obama have “spent an enormous amount of time trying to personally tear each other down. And, I think, that voters do not respond well to that.”

“I was way behind here, and I’ve clearly been moving this week," he told MSNBC in a live interview from Charleston, S.C. “So we’ll just have to see what happens today.”