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Hours after a neck-and-neck finish with Hillary Clinton in Iowa and shortly before landing in New Hampshire, Bernie Sanders walked to the back of his campaign plane and declared he had taken a “giant step” forward for his campaign.

The Sanders campaign, and the Vermont senator himself, are trying hard to cast the result in Iowa — “a virtual tie,” he calls it — as a victory, one that gave his campaign a “kick start” as they hit the campaign trail in a state where he already had a significant lead over Mrs. Clinton.

On the plane, a smiling Mr. Sanders said that the Iowa caucuses proved to people who disparaged his campaign as “fringe” that he is electable and that his message will resonate far beyond Iowa.

When asked whether New Hampshire, where the New Englander was leading and is highly familiar, presented him with a must-win situation, he gave a mocking chuckle.

“You know guys, we’re in this for the long haul,” he said. “We are going to win states all over this country. Please don’t ask me after, ‘Gee, is your victory in Minnesota, if you don’t win Minnesota will you dah, di, dah.’ We are in this until the convention. We are going to win some states. And, we’re going to lose some states.”

He remained vague on whether he would participate in a proposed debate in New Hampshire and whether he would contest any of the results in Iowa. He thanked the reporters and returned to the front of the plane.

Earlier in the flight (on a plane the campaign called “Bernie Express” but reporters called “Air Bern One”), his campaign manager, Jeff Weaver, handled the harder politics and gloated about the campaign’s ground game.

“I think we demonstrated that we had at least a good an understanding and at least a good a ground game and I would certainly argue a better one,” he said.

Everyone on board was on message.

As the plane landed after 4 a.m., the pilot came over the intercom to “congratulate” the campaign on “your victory” in Iowa.

Soon afterward in Bow, N.H., Mr. Sanders stood in the back of a pickup truck in a parking lot and spoke to hundreds of cheering supporters who had gathered before sunrise.

“We just got in from Iowa where we astounded the world, and now in New Hampshire we are going to astound the world again,” he said.

The Vermont senator told the shivering crowd that the fact that he had come within striking distance of Mrs. Clinton proved middle and working-class people were ready for a revolution led by an Independent democratic socialist.

Several people in the crowd shouted, “We love you, Bernie.”

“We love you too,” Mr. Sanders said, with his wife, Jane, by his side.

He said that he was looking forward to a “great victory here in New Hampshire.” But he added that there was a long road ahead.

“We are in this together,” Mr. Sanders said, to cheers. “We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us.”