Bernie Sanders needed nothing short of a big win in West Virginia to keep any hope alive in his bid for the Democratic nomination. On Tuesday night, he delivered.

Sanders defeated Hillary Clinton in a state she won in 2008, notching another victory to keep him on a path to the nomination. But even that, by Sanders’ own admission, will be a narrow country road to navigate.


With 61.7 percent of precincts reporting Tuesday evening, Sanders led Clinton 51 percent to 36.7 percent.

“With our victory tonight in West Virginia, we have now won primaries and caucuses in 19 states. And let me be as clear as I can be: We are in this campaign to win the Democratic nomination," Sanders told a cheering crowd of supporters in Salem, Oregon, which votes next Tuesday.

Only NBC had called the race in Sanders' favor before the Vermont senator's campaign blasted out a celebratory message from the candidate. By 8:45 p.m., Fox joined in its call. The Associated Press issued its call around 9:25 p.m.

"Every vote we earn and every delegate we secure sends an unmistakable message about the values we share, the country's support for the ideas of our campaign, and a rejection of Donald Trump and his values," Sanders said in a statement, touting the fact that he is outperforming Clinton against the presumptive Republican nominee in numerous polls, including a trio from Quinnipiac University released Tuesday.

With Sanders' projected victory, he's slated to win a majority of the 29 pledged delegates at stake Tuesday in West Virginia, which — like all states in the Democratic primary — doles out delegates in proportion to the popular vote.

In a separate statement released by Sanders’ campaign shortly after AP made its call, the candidate thanked “the people of West Virginia for the tremendous victory they gave us today in a state that provided a landslide vote for Hillary Clinton in 2008.”

Indeed, Clinton beat then Sen. Barack Obama by 40 points in 2008, a stark contrast from her showing Tuesday night.

“West Virginia is a working-class state and many of the people there are hurting. They know, like most Americans, that it is too late for establishment politics and establishment economics. They want real change,” Sanders said, going on to tick through a list of upcoming contests where the campaign expects to win as well.

While conceding that he faces an uphill climb, Sanders struck an upbeat tone echoing similar messages in recent weeks after similar victories.

“And after all the votes are cast and counted and this contest moves to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, the delegates will decide which candidate is the strongest nominee to take on Donald Trump in November,” Sanders said. “All of the evidence indicates that I am that candidate.”

Sanders reprised the acknowledgment in Salem, vowing to stop Trump from becoming the next president.

"Now, we fully acknowledge we are good at arithmetic, that we have an uphill climb ahead of us, but we are used to fighting uphill climbs. We have been fighting uphill from the first day of this campaign when people considered us a fringe candidacy," Sanders declared. "And our message to the Democratic delegates who will be assembling in Philadelphia is, while we may have many disagreements with Secretary Clinton, there is one area [where] we agree. And that is, we must defeat Donald Trump."

The night's other Democratic contest, in Nebraska, was purely a show vote. State Democrats already held caucuses on March 5, when Sanders won 15 of the state's 25 pledged delegates. Tuesday, voters will cast ballots on their presidential preference, but no delegates were at stake. Nevertheless, Clinton won the contest, with The Associated Press making the call at 9:49 p.m. Eastern.

Indeed, May has all the markings of a pleasant month for Sanders, with favorable contests in Oregon and Kentucky next Tuesday coming after his upset victory in Indiana on May 3. At this point in the primary, however, Sanders needs more than wins; he needs superdelegate miracles.

Entering Tuesday night, Clinton led Sanders 1,705 to 1,415 in pledged delegates and 523 to 39 in superdelegates, an overall lead of 2,228 to 1,454. With only 926 pledged delegates remaining, Sanders' hopes rest with superdelegates deciding to abandon Clinton in large numbers.

The Clinton campaign is confident enough that that won't happen that, in recent weeks, it has turned its attention largely to Trump.

Rallying supporters in Louisville, Kentucky, on Tuesday evening, Clinton devoted a portion of her stump speech to once again decry the “reckless talk coming from Donald Trump."

“So I gotta tell you, I am, if I am so fortunate enough as to be the nominee, I am looking forward to debating Donald Trump come the fall," she said, to cheers.

While acknowledging the need for healthy political debate in the United States, Clinton lamented the recent coarsening of rhetoric.

“You don’t do that by denigrating people, demeaning people. That is not what we are. And it’s time that we said enough. We’re willing to have good political debates, but enough with the hate rhetoric and the insults and let’s look for ways that we can work together," she said.

Clinton is facing criticism in West Virginia for remarking in March that she intended to "put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business." The comment came in the context of her plans to find jobs for those workers in new industries, but it went over terribly in the state.

But she did not kick off her week of campaigning in West Virginia. Instead, on Monday, Clinton was in a café in the affluent Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., where she courted women with a discussion on the importance of a "work-life balance."

"For some, it's family leave and, particularly, the absence of paid family leave, because that makes it more difficult to deal with everything from newborns to aging relatives," Clinton said. "Others, it's just a continuing stress of a workplace that doesn't provide enough compensation with rising incomes. There still is a challenge with equal pay for women, which is real — it's not made up."

She was in West Virginia last week as part of a two-day van tour of greater Appalachia. In addition to stops in West Virginia and Kentucky, which votes next Tuesday, Clinton traveled to the southeast Ohio town of Athens on May 3 to discuss economic issues.

Clinton's general election focus comes as much of the party pushes for a united front, but Sanders has shown no intention of bowing out quietly. He spent most of Thursday rallying supporters in rural McDowell County; the capital, Charleston; and Morgantown, the home of West Virginia University. Clinton flew west for a rally in East Los Angeles.

On Monday, Sanders continued to beat down the primary path with a rally on the campus of Rutgers University in New Jersey ahead of the state's June 7 primary, when delegate-rich California also votes.

“If we can win here in New Jersey and win in California and win in some of the other states, and if we can win a majority of the pledged delegates, we’re gonna go into Philadelphia and the Democratic convention and expect to come out with the Democratic nomination. So don’t let — don’t let anybody tell you this campaign is over. We’re gonna fight for the last vote we can find in New Jersey and California,” he told his audience in Piscataway.

Sanders flew west to Sacramento, California, on Monday evening, rallying supporters while at the same time appearing on a taped episode of "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" on CBS. Tuesday's schedule bore out much of the same for both candidates, with Clinton holding a conversation with young working parents in Lexington, Kentucky, in the morning and delivering remarks on the same topic later in the day in Louisville before hosting a rally in the same city.