Honolulu Star-Advertiser

Thursday, December 12, 2024 79° Today's Paper


Top News

Trump, Sanders victorious in New Hampshire primaries

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., smiles as he greats attendees during a campaign stop at the University of New Hampshire Whittemore Center Arena, Monday in Durham, N.H.

Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Bernie Sanders swept to victory in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primaries, adding crucial credibility to their upstart candidacies and underscoring voters’ insistence on shaking up American politics.

While New Hampshire is known for its political surprises, Trump and Sanders led in the state for months. Still, both needed to deliver on expectations after second-place finishes in last week’s leadoff Iowa caucuses, where Ted Cruz topped the Republican field and Hillary Clinton narrowly edged Sanders in the Democratic race.

“When we stand together, we win. Thank you, New Hampshire!” Sanders celebrated on Twitter.

For some Republican leaders, Trump’s and Cruz’s victories add urgency to the need to coalesce around a more mainstream candidate to challenge them. However, it was unclear whether New Hampshire’s contest would clarify that slice of the field, with Ohio Gov. John Kasich, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush all locked in a tight race, along with Cruz.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who has staked his candidacy on New Hampshire, lagged behind the pack in early vote counts.

Sanders pulled from a broad coalition of New Hampshire voters, gathering a majority of votes from men, independents and voters under 45, as well as a slim majority of women. Clinton won the majority of those over 65 and those with incomes over $200,000 a year, according to early exit polls conducted by Edison Research for The Associated Press and the television networks.

Clinton’s campaign argues she will perform better as the race heads to more racially diverse states, including Nevada and South Carolina. Both New Hampshire and Iowa are overwhelmingly white states that are far less diverse than the nation as a whole.

“A Democrat who is unable to inspire strong levels of support in minority communities will have no credible path to winning the presidency in the general election,” Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said in a memo released as the polls closed.

Both Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, and Trump, a real estate mogul who has never held political office, have tapped into the public’s frustration with the current political system. Even if neither candidate ultimately becomes his party’s nominee, whoever does will have to reckon with those factions of voters.

Nearly half of voters in the Republican primary made up their minds in the past week. Republican voters were more negative about their politicians than Democrats, with about half of GOP voters saying they felt betrayed by party officials.

In a sign of Trump’s impact on the race, two-thirds of GOP voters said they supported a temporary ban on non-citizen Muslims entering the U.S., a position the billionaire outlined last year amid rising fears of terrorism emanating from the Middle East.

After finishing behind Cruz in Iowa last week, Trump embraced some of the more traditional trappings of presidential campaigns, including smaller town hall events with voters. Still, he closed the final full day of campaigning with a vulgar insult of Cruz.

The Texas senator brushed off Trump’s comments, saying the reason the businessman engages in insults “is because he can’t discuss the substance.”

The large Republican field was winnowed after Iowa, but there remains a crowded grouping of more traditional candidates, including Rubio and the governors.

Rubio had appeared to be breaking away after a stronger-than-expected showing in Iowa, but he stumbled in Saturday’s debate under intense pressure from Christie. The New Jersey governor has relentlessly cast the young senator as too inexperienced and too reliant on memorized talking points to become president.

Rubio played into Christie’s hands by responding with the same well-rehearsed line each time he was challenged by the governor. Rival campaigns hoped the moment was enough to give voters pause.

Kasich, Bush and Christie all poured enormous resources into New Hampshire in hope of jumpstarting their White House bids in a state that has been friendly to moderate Republicans. All three could face pressure from party leaders and financial donors to end their campaigns without a strong showing.

63 responses to “Trump, Sanders victorious in New Hampshire primaries”

  1. sarge22 says:

    Make America Great Again. We are on our way.

    • RichardCory says:

      Hold on there, little buddy. Sanders hasn’t won the election just yet. Let’s wait for his victory in the national election before getting too excited. Then you can go ahead and break out the champagne.

    • csdhawaii says:

      I really feel sorry for Republicans. Trump is the only option for their “anti-establishment” vote while Democrats have Sanders, a much more credible and electable option. I kind of understand their frustration, but even with – what – 17 candidates in the beginning, all the Repubs options were just so much ca-ca. The big ca ca has risen to the top and it ain’t pretty. But they’ve done it to themselves. They will lie in their own ca ca while Sanders will become the next President of the U.S.

      • hawaiikone says:

        What’s beginning to worry me is the inescapable fact that neither Clinton nor Saunders has the ability to inspire a frustrated public. Trump, as incredulous as it may seem, has a growing credibility generated in part by that same reality, and stands a reasonable chance of becoming our next president. All that’s needed at this point is some viable, sensible, and coherent thoughts from him and he’ll begin to lock in more and more voters. God help us if this plays out as it very well could, as there are several out there far better suited to face the challenges ahead.

        • mitt_grund says:

          A blatant racist and misogynist. Trump is beginning to sound like another A. Hitler, pushing for the rebirth of the Aryan uebermensch.

        • Cricket_Amos says:

          Mitt-grund

          The lady doth protest too much, methinks

        • Keonigohan says:

          Libs are WORRIED! hiLIARy needs to forget about her coronation ball.

        • HIE says:

          HA HA HA!!! The libs are worried? The tard conservatives are so worried, they’re voting for a bankruptcy veteran, draft-dodging, divorce expert who wants to bone his own daughter. And the libs are worried? BWAHAHAHAHA!

        • hawaiikone says:

          Mr grund and hie, if indeed your characterizations of Trump had any validity, which they don’t other than as typical character assassinations, think for a moment how his popularity reflects on your own candidates attractiveness. Pretty sad commentary on the dismal lack of leadership within the democratic party. Bereft of quality offerings, your selections have little more to offer than Trump does, and, with a frustrated populace looking to shakeup Washington, the perfect storm seems to be brewing. Not that I support Trump in any way, yet much of the blame for his acendance has to fall on your own party’s shoulders.

      • South76 says:

        Those who wish to have a socialist government, I challenge you to take a two weeks trip to Venezuela or even North Korea and see how things are going there for having a socialist government. Venezuela is the newest socialist coutry, see how the local people live since they have become a socialist country. Read back on Eastern Europe’s past, see how the socialist government ran that part of the world. Who had the means and who did not.

    • mikethenovice says:

      America is always great no matter who is the President is.

    • Keonigohan says:

      Libs are WORRIED and well as they should be…thank Obama for this>>>Bernie/hiLIARy…is that all you folks got?

  2. MoiLee says:

    Goooooooo ! Donald Trump! Make America Great Again! Good job on New Hampshire!

  3. noheawilli says:

    Both party’s are failing the American people.

  4. Ronin006 says:

    What a shocker. Hillary came in dead last in the Democrat primary, DEAD LAST.

  5. wilikitutu says:

    Even if she did not wif she did not win Clinton has done well. It’s up to us kupunas to persuade the younger folk,ill, Clinton has done well. It’s up to us kupunas to persuade the younger folk,

    • sarge22 says:

      The kapunas have been around for a long time and know all about Clinton’s shady past. The young people have figured it out also. Stick a fork in her and then there is the FBI. Give her a participation trophy.

      • South76 says:

        Yeah, she call herserlf a feminist but when she found out her husband was screwing someone else behind her back, instead of taking him to the cleaners she stood by him. She also mentioned that they became flat broke after spending eight years at the white house, yet instead of running away from it, she wants to be back inside again. Sounds like she has a mental problem, a battered woman syndrome where she’s too dependent on their abusers, they can’t seem to stay from them. She needs a guide to see the light, there is hope Hillary….Hope Arkansas that is, LOL.

    • mitt_grund says:

      You sound like Rubio repeating himself in the debate.

  6. lee1957 says:

    Kasich seems to be the only adult in the room.

  7. Jiujitsu_Fighter says:

    The end for Hillary’s hope for Presidency has ended.

  8. WizardOfMoa says:

    Gov. Chris Christie was a person of interest on the onset of this presidential race. However, as time moves on he seems quite forceful and desperate but what drove us further away from him was his attack on fellow party candidate Rubio after the latter shown up with a better result than expected. If he had shown some degree of support to all the fellow candidates including Rubio it may have help boost up his ratings in New Hampshire!

  9. iwanaknow says:

    If they offered cash prizes to vote……..maybe I would vote?

  10. mikethenovice says:

    American is not kidding when it says that they don’t want another, Bush or Clinton.

  11. Andrew1 says:

    Sick and tired of the politicians d*cking us around. Our country is no longer the superpower it once was. I blame both sides of the aisle as they only have their big money special interest buddies. I say screw them!

  12. btaim says:

    The article points out that “two-thirds of GOP voters said they supported a temporary ban on non-citizen Muslims entering the U.S.” Well if that’s the case, given that numerous murderers and criminals in this country are white, we should also have a ban on any white person entering this country. Silly. I’m waiting for their rallying cry to morph into “Let’s Make America White Again”. That’s what they really stand for.

  13. bsdetection says:

    Before he quits, Christie could do the nation a huge favor by executing a political hit job on Trump, like the fatal hit he delivered to the hapless Rubio campaign. None of the other candidates have the nerve or the political vindictiveness to pull it off.

  14. st1d says:

    cheer up hiliar:

    mandela spent 27 years in prison and was elected president of his country.

    it could happen to you.

  15. Jonathan_Patrick says:

    Politics has a way of either bringing people together or creating a wall between people. Why could we not have total unity, so that we do not need to fight?

Leave a Reply