Saturday, January 26, 2008

Obama lead in SC poll widens

In the last polling before the SC primary, Obama is the firmly established front runner. From Reuters via Boston.Com:
COLUMBIA, South Carolina (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama expanded his lead on rival Hillary Clinton to 15 points heading into South Carolina's bitterly contested presidential primary, according to a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll released on Saturday.

Obama, an Illinois senator, gained two points on Clinton overnight to lead 41 percent to 26 percent just hours before voting began in Saturday's primary. John Edwards was in third place after slipping two points to 19 percent.

[..]

The poll had a margin of error of 3.4 percentage points.

Obama has led Clinton by double-digits in all four days of polls in South Carolina, fueled by a huge advantage among the black voters who are expected to make up about half of the electorate in the first Democratic primary in the South.

Obama, who would be the first black U.S. president, was favored by 62 percent of black voters, with Clinton at 18 percent and Edwards at 5 percent.
In other primary news, Sen. Hillary Clinton is appealing to the DNC to allow Florida's and Michigan's delegates to count in the national convention. This AP story via The Raw Story details the situation.

Clinton is the only top-tier candidate who campaigned in Florida, as the DNC has docked them their delegates as punishment for moving their primary against party rules. Florida has 185 delegates and whoever is awarded that number will gain nearly 10% of the delegates required for nomination.

Sen. Obama's campaign has stated that the senator regrets the state losing their delegates and that the voters of the state will be important in the general election.

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