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American Morning

Hillary Clinton Wins Texas and Ohio Primaries

Aired March 05, 2008 - 05:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning and thanks very much for joining us on this Wednesday, the fifth day of March, a big morning after that super Tuesday, crucial Tuesday, critical Tuesday, whatever you wan to call it. We got a lot of news to tell you.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: That's right and every Wednesday morning, we wake up and it's a whole new race it seems. Before you went to bed last night, if you were listening to some of the (INAUDIBLE) it seemed like it was going to very tough for Hillary Clinton to stay in the race and this morning she racked up two big wins, both in Ohio and Texas, a game changer this morning.

KING: Big news here in the United States and we welcome our international viewers on CNNI this morning as we have got a lot to tell you about because a big shake up last night, the whole thing changes going forward.

CHETRY: That's right and we're still waiting for the results of the caucuses in Texas. You remember they call it the Texas two step. They had a primary and a caucus, so we'll be bringing you that throughout the morning. Meanwhile, the top story of the day is the comeback, a night for Hillary Clinton for sure. She was facing must win contests and she pulled off the two biggest prizes of the night, winning both the Texas primaries, 51 percent to Barack Obama's 48 percent. As I said, they're still counting up the delegates because the caucus results have to be awarded as well.

Meantime, Senator Clinton also won Ohio, 55 percent to Barack Obama's 43 percent and just weeks ago, her husband, former President Bill Clinton said she needed wins in both states to stay in the race. Here's the delegate map as it stands so far. For the Democrats, Clinton states are in the light blue and she also won Rhode Island last night. She now has 1365 delegates by CNN's count. Barack Obama winning Vermont last night and the states that he won are in the darker blue. Obama has 1451 delegates, that's 86 delegates ahead of Clinton; 2025 delegates are needed to win the nomination.

And last minute undecided voters as well as older voters turned out to be vital in Senator Clinton's wins. She was all smiles at her victory speech in Columbus, Ohio, dedicating her comeback to Ohio voters, telling them they were the key to her big night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know what they say, as Ohio goes, so goes the nation. Well, this nation's coming back and so is this campaign. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: Sen. Barack Obama won Vermont earlier in the night before Clinton took the three other primaries. He spoke to his supporters in Texas and downplayed her win.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: No matter what happens tonight, we have nearly the same delegate lead as we did this morning and we are on our way to winning this nomination.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: So what's ahead? Well, the Wyoming caucuses are going to be held on Saturday, Mississippi primaries next Tuesday and Pennsylvania is really what's shaping up to be next big race. That's April 22nd, 158 delegates up for grabs. John.

KING: He is the last Republican standing, a four-state sweep capped a remarkable comeback for Sen. John McCain. Now he has more than enough delegates to become the party's presidential nominee and maybe months to watch his two potential opponents fight it out and do some of his work for him. Here's the break down here. John McCain won 51 percent of the vote in Texas, Mike Huckabee, 13 points back. Ron Paul came in at 5 percent in his home state, but Ron Paul making the point this morning that he won the primary in his home district.

In Ohio, John McCain took 60 percent of the vote there, Mike Huckabee, 31 percent, Ron Paul again came in with 5 percent. That seems to be his threshold there. John McCain now has 1226 delegates, cracking that magic number of 1191. Mike Huckabee finished up the race with 251. McCain states are in red here. Mike Huckabee's are in pink, Mitt Romney's still on the board there in maroon. And just eight months ago, McCain's second White House bid left for dead. But last night, he celebrated the end of his long comeback in Dallas, telling supporters that he was looking forward to the next fight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN McCAIN (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I understand the responsibilities I incur with this nomination and I give you my word, I will not evade or slight a single one. Our campaign must be and will be more than another tired debate of false promises, empty sound bites or useless arguments from the past that address not a single of America's concerns for their families' security.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: And it was a heck of a ride for Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor fought an uphill battle for months, boosted by a winning streak across the south, but falling about a 1,000 delegates short in the end. He cited some personal victories as he bowed out in defeat.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MIKE HUCKABEE (R) FMR. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: One of the things that we will be able to say is not only that we fought the good fight and finished the race. We'd like to have finished it first but we stayed in until the race was over. But I think more importantly we kept the faith and that for me has been the most important goal of all. I'd rather lose an election than lose the principles that got me into politics in the first place.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Huckabee also said that he called John McCain to offer his help in the general elections. We'll see what kind of help he can be going forward.

CHETRY: Well, the best political team on television as we cover this morning, we have Dana Bash in Dallas. She's with the Republicans or I should I say Republican this morning. Suzanne Malveaux covering the Democrats in Austin and Bill Schneider right here in New York, breaking down the exit polling for us, some fascinating looks at what made the voters choose the way they did. Also Ali Velshi, he's still on the election express. He's in Vandera (ph), Texas this morning.

We're going to start with Suzanne in Austin and what a dramatic night for Senator Clinton who at least it seemed this morning, managed to get her campaign back on track.

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kiran, it's a whole new game. It's a wholly different game for the Clinton campaign. We will hear from Senator Clinton later in the morning as she makes those rounds for the TV talk shows this morning, including CNN, but essentially what they're saying is the momentum has shifted. They believe that voters are expressing buyer's remorse. They say Senator Obama was not able to close the deal here. They believe that they have proven, at least made a strong case that Senator Clinton is a stronger commander in chief, that she has a consistent position when it comes to trade and the argument that they're making this morning Kiran is essentially that she can win, not only the big states like Texas and California, but she can also win in those critical states that Democrats are going to need for the general election. That is Ohio, New Mexico. She even talks about Michigan and Florida.

Let's take a look at how she is framing the debate (ph). This is going to be very similar to what we're going to hear in the next couple of days and weeks ahead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: Protecting America is the first and most urgent duty of the president. When there is a crisis and that phone rings at 3:00 a.m. in the White House, there's no time for speeches or on-the-job training. We have to be ready to make a decision.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: But what you're also going to hear as well, Senator Barack Obama, he is going to be talking this morning and he is making the case that look, look at the numbers here. It's all about the delegate count. It is not necessarily about - it's not about the number of states. It's about the delegate count and they say that they are still ahead in the delegate count and they still say that Senator Clinton cannot catch up when it comes to those pledged delegates and that ultimately is what's going to push him forward to get his nomination. Let's take a look at how Senator Barack Obama is framing the debate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: In the weeks to come, we will begin a great debate about the future of this country with a man who has served it bravely and loves it dearly. Tonight I called John McCain and congratulated him on winning the Republican nomination. But in this election, we will offer two very different visions of the America we see in the 21st century.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: So Kiran, you already hear Barack Obama really positioning himself to go up against Senator John McCain in this race. They are confident that they are going to win when it comes to Wyoming as well as Mississippi, moving towards Pennsylvania. Clinton's camp once again saying that look, they're going to be competitive when it comes to those pledged delegates, but ultimately, it's going to come down to the total number of delegates. That includes the super delegates and the argument they're making is that they believe they're better positioned in the general election to take on John McCain than Senator Barack Obama. Kiran.

CHETRY: All right, we'll see. We're going to be speaking to both of them actually, Suzanne this morning, Senator Clinton and Obama joining us right here live on AMERICAN MORNING. We're going to be speaking to Senator Obama at 7:15 Eastern, right after that, Hillary Clinton will be joining us.

KING: Turning now to the Republicans, as we said, Senator John McCain made it a clean sweep last night, winning all four primaries. He now has now more than the required number of delegates and is the presumptive GOP nominee. CNN's Dana Bash is in Dallas this morning and Dana, McCain is expected to pick up a fairly large endorsement a little bit later on today.

DANA BASH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A fairly large endorsement from somebody who he battled and lost to eight years ago and that of course is the president, George W. Bush. McCain is going to go to the White House today. The two men are going to have lunch and then they are going to come out together before the press and George Bush is going to formally endorse John McCain.

Now this is something that is certainly a bit controversial. If you're a Democrat, they're absolutely gleeful that they're going to have this picture, but for John McCain, this is something that he understands he has to do for a number of reasons. But you know, the issue really that binds them is something that he knows he can't get away from John and that is the war in Iraq and already behind me just a few hours ago, when John McCain was essentially declaring himself the new Republican nominee, he said he was not going to run from the war in Iraq. He said he thought that going and toppling Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do and started to put that dividing line down between himself and whichever of the Democratic nominees, Democratic candidates will be his opponent.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

McCAIN: I will defend the decision to destroy Saddam Hussein's regime. As I also criticized the failed tactics that were employed for too long, to establish the conditions that will allow us to leave that country with our country's interests secure and our honor intact.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Now after John McCain goes to the White House, there's no doubt that they're going to talk about that issue, the war in Iraq. And he's going to go over to the Republican National Committee and that is something that is very important to this campaign right now because John, you know, the McCain campaign is still very, very small, very few staffers. They don't have a lot of money and right now, because McCain is now the nominee of the Republican party, he and his campaign will be able to assume the whole infrastructure at the RNC and that means a lot of staff they don't have, a lot of money that they don't have and some of the data and key elements that they need to build their fall campaign and you mentioned the Democrats certainly, there is a little bit of a mixed blessing about the Democrats race grabbing the headlines. But there is no question that the more that they go at it, the more it gives John McCain time to build his campaign without a clear Democratic opponent. John.

KING: But at the same time Dana, the Democrats are saying, wow, that's going to be a great picture for us, John McCain standing side by side with George Bush. That's really going to energize Democrats.

BASH: Absolutely, talking to McCain's campaign manager about that very thing last night, I said do you really want to do this and John McCain standing next to George Bush because of that reason. I told him what all the Democratic blogs were saying and he said, look. This is something that we have raised. This is something that John McCain needs to do. We've been talking for a very long time about the need for McCain to unite conservatives behind him. They hope that standing next to George Bush, who is still very popular with conservatives, will help. The other thing that they hope is that McCain is such a known quantity, is such an individual in and of himself, that people will judge him for John McCain and not George Bush. But as you well know, the Democrats are already doing everything they can to make it as if the McCain presidency would be just another third Bush term. Having that picture certainly will help.

KING: All right, Dana Bash for us this morning, Dana thanks very much. Kiran.

CHETRY: What's next in the wild ride for the Democrats? It's Wyoming Saturday. There are just 12 delegates available in the caucus there, but as we've been talking about this morning, with only 86 delegates separating the two Democratic contenders, everyone counts, it's on to Mississippi with 33 delegates in that state, but the next major showdown in Pennsylvania, April 22nd, 158 delegates up for grabs. And if we do go on from there, it'll be May and June races in places like Indiana, North Carolina, Kentucky and Oregon.

KING: You're watching the most news in the morning. How did Hillary Clinton pull off her crucial victory in Texas? Our Bill Schneider tells us which group she won over coming up on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: People of Ohio have said it loudly and clearly. We're going on. We're going strong and we're going all the way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Welcome back to the most news in the morning. Hillary Clinton is back in the race, turning out three key states and keeping her presidential hopes alive. So which groups of voters pushed her over the top? Our senior political analyst Bill Schneider joins us now with a look at the exit polls. So what happened last night? It's some pretty interesting data.

BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Very interesting data and probably the most interesting single fact is white men. White men in Texas voted for Hillary Clinton. It's a very narrow margin, just 3 point margin, 50 percent for Clinton, 47 percent for Obama, but in previous states, white men have voted for the man, Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton. Here in Texas, what you see is white men giving the edge to Hillary Clinton joining white women who are voting, who did vote for Hillary Clinton in about the numbers they voted for her in other primaries. It's the breakthrough among white men that really put (INAUDIBLE)

KING: ... behind that? Any idea?

SCHNEIDER: Very likely from what we can tell, economics, finances. They're very worried about finances and they see Hillary Clinton as a Democrat who can deliver.

KING: What else have we found out with these polls?

SCHNEIDER: Well, take a look at African-American and Latino voters, two very important constituencies in Texas, African-Americans overwhelming for Barack Obama 83 to 16. Latino voters were two thirds for Clinton, 31 percent for Obama. Notice a couple of things. Obama does about twice as well among Latinos as Hillary Clinton does among African-Americans and a third of Latinos are voting for Barack Obama.

Now, how big were these groups? African-Americans were 19 percent of the voters in Texas, but Latinos were 34 percent of the voters.

KING: Very large voting bloc. SCHNEIDER: Right. If you do the math, what you'll find is they canceled each other out. What happens is, Obama's lead among the smaller African-American vote was so powerful that he canceled out Hillary Clinton's lead among the larger Latino.

KING: And she won white men by about the usual margins, so does that mean that this came down to white men that created that narrow margin of victory for her.

SCHNEIDER: White men certainly, yes. But actually, I would think she would say her margin of victory was due to Latino voters, because the African-American vote and the white vote were about equal, that is the margins were counterbalancing each other. So if she owes her victory in Texas to anyone...

KING: It is those Hispanic voters.

SCHNEIDER: It's those Latino voters.

KING: That's what she was counting on. Bill Schneider, thanks very much. Bill's going to be joining us again a little bit later on this hour with a look at what swayed those last minute voters over to Hillary Clinton. Kiran.

CHETRY: All right, well slamming on the breaks on the Obama freight train. How does he hold onto his lead in key states coming up? The best political team on TV is going to breaking it down ahead on this special early edition 5:00 a.m. AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Welcome back to the most politics of the morning, Barack Obama is moving on from last night's losses, focusing less on Hillary Clinton and more on November and the Republican candidate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: John McCain may claim a long history of straight talk and independent thinking and I respect that. But in this campaign, he has fallen in line behind the very same policies that have ill served America. He has seen where George Bush has taken our country and he promises to keep us on the very same course. It's the same course that threatens a century of war in Iraq, a third and fourth and fifth tour of duty for brave troops who have done all we've asked them, even while we have asked little and expect nothing from the Iraqi government, whose job it is to put their country back together, a course where we spend billions of dollars a week that could be used to rebuild our roads and our schools to care for our veterans and send our children to college.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: We will speak with Senator Obama live coming up in our 7:00 hour and we're also going to give you a listen to extended segments of what they said last night, so that you can get a real sense of where this race is going. CHETRY: That's right and right after that, Hillary Clinton is going to join us as well to weigh in. Meanwhile our Alina Cho is here with some other stories new this morning. Alina, good to see you.

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey there, glad you're feeling better. Good morning, welcome back (INAUDIBLE) good morning everybody. Topping our news this hour, President Bush says he's still optimistic a Mideast peace deal be worked out before he leaves office in 10 months, but there are some discouraging developments in the region this morning. Israeli soldiers have re-entered northern Gaza. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice meanwhile wrapping up her two-day trip to the region today. Rice is pressing both sides to resume peace talks. Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas has suspended talks after the Israeli army launched a military offensive against Hamas militants last week.

A passenger jet was forced to make an emergency landing in Florida last night after several passengers mysteriously got sick. Here's what happening. The Airtrans flight was en route from the Dominican Republic to Canada when it had to land in Ft. Lauderdale. Eight people were apparently taken to the hospital. The remaining 230 passengers were evaluated and then they were allowed to continue on to Canada. There is no word yet on what caused the mysterious illnesses.

Health news now, researchers have found more dangers associated with hormone replacement therapy. The new study found women who took those hormones during and after menopause increased their risk of cancer, especially breast cancer. Now while the increase was slight, the study's authors found it still lingered for up to five years after they stopped taking the hormone. Now researchers also found the risk for heart attack and stroke diminished once those hormones were stopped, but they say, the risk far outweighed the benefits.

Making time for phys ed can boost a young girl's academic performance. That's according to a new study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Researchers say girls who spent between 70 and 300 minutes a week in gym class actually scored higher on reading and math than those who spent less than 35 minutes a week. The findings address concerns by school administrators who are considering cutting phys ed to raise test scores.

And a New York woman has delivered a set of identical triplets, look at these little ones. Doctors say it's so rare, it happens just once in every 200 million births. The parents say they actually put dots of maroon nail polish on their fingers to tell the babies apart. The boys by the way were born last Wednesday and they were taken home over the weekend, how cute are they, tiny little things. Apparently the parents as many people who go through in vitro do, were trying for four years. They wanted just one. They ended up with three.

CHETRY: And it was very rare, because they only implanted one egg and that split and then split again, so I mean pretty amazing, one in 200 million, incredible.

CHO: You hear about identical twins but not triplets.

CHETRY: And the boys are getting their manicures early in life, how about that? Thanks Alina.

Well Ali Velshi joins us from Vandera, Texas this morning. He's been touring the state and he's literally been through every single place in Texas on the CNN election express. He's been talking to voters about the economy and also how that affected their votes in Tuesday's primary and caucuses in that state. Hey, Ali.

ALI VELSHI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning Kiran. I wish I had been to every little place, because every little place we've been to has been so fantastic and it's with a heavy heart that we leave Texas today, but I hope we'll be back.

We have learned a lot in Texas about what actually affects people. I must say the over arching matter that we've dealt with in Texas - there have been talk about jobs and immigration, border patrol, health care. But gas prices really have been the number one and I'm glad that I can leave Texas with just a little bit of good news for everybody out there. Take a look at what oil prices have done. Yesterday they came down to below $100 for the first time since February 27. I mean what a day when we're celebrating the fact that oil prices are $99.52 a barrel.

We're trying to sort of study what's going on with oil and where we think this is going to go because it's really not all that useful for me to tell you what a barrel of oil costs unless you happen to be buying a barrel of oil. I will tell you what gasoline is going at right now however. It's $3.17 a gallon and that is not good news. That's moving upward. In fact I think $3.25 is the highest we've ever paid for gasoline and the trend in gasoline is upward. It's still catching up to that $100 and almost $104 that it got to, so we're not expecting great news on the gasoline front, but we're going to get to the bottom of what OPEC is planning to do and how that's affecting the price of oil.

When I come back, I'm going to talk to you about how the economy played into the votes. Our exit polls have given us a lot of information both in Ohio and Texas because I think the rest of America is going to find that the concerns in Texas and Ohio are very much the same as they share. So I'll be back to you with that in just a minute, Kiran.

CHETRY: All right, sounds good, Ali, thanks.

KING: You're watching the most news in the morning. It was do or die and she did. We have morning after analysis of Hillary Clinton's big night and what it means for her and Barack Obama going forward. And Mike Huckabee bows out, throwing his support to John McCain. Is the Republican party unified this morning? That story and today's headlines when AMERICAN MORNING returns.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: And welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING. We run a little bit early today because some of you made it on the bed last night before you knew who won. Two key states -- actually four states, but two big ones last night. ROBERTS: And there's still one contest yet to be decided. It was a banner night for Senator Hillary Clinton. She breaks Senator Barack Obama's winning streak with three victories last night.

Clinton won Texas 51 to 48 percent. The Texas caucus is worth the third of the state's delegates. They are still being tabulated at this point. Clinton also won Ohio, 54 percent to 44 percent.

One analyst said the controversy over the North American Free Trade Agreement helped her in this state.

Taking a look now at the delegate map. Clinton, in the light blue, also won Rhode Island and now has 1,365 delegates. Obama, in the dark blue, won Vermont and has 86 delegates ahead with 1,451. Two thousand and 25 delegates are needed to win the Democratic nomination.

The undecideds and older voters came out big for Hillary Clinton. With the wins, she lives to fight on for at least the next two months.

Serenaded by cheers and Bruce Springsteen's "The Rising," she dedicated her comeback to Ohio voters and promised them she won't talk, she'll act.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have big dreams for America's future. The question is not whether we can fulfill those dreams, it's whether we will. And here's our answer, yes, we will. We will do what it takes and we will, once again, make the kind of progress that America deserves.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Vermont was Senator Obama's only victory of the night, extending his winning streak until Clinton's Rhode Island win ended it.

Speaking to supporters in Texas, he dismissed Senator Clinton's and McCain's criticisms of his speeches and he took specific aim at the now presumptive Republican nominee.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: John McCain may claim long history. A straight talk and independent thinking, and I respect that, but in this campaign, he is following in line behind those very same policies that have ill-served America. He has seen where George Bush has taken our country and he promises to keep us on the very same course.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: So what is next? Pennsylvania is the next big race but won't come until April the 22nd, that's seven weeks from now. The Wyoming caucus is this Saturday, the Mississippi primary next Tuesday-- Kiran? CHETRY: Well, on the Republican side, the question is pretty much settled. John McCain clinching the nomination and Mike Huckabee bowing out of the race. When you take a look at how everything shook out, John McCain -- well, in Texas and Ohio, both was over the top.

Looking at the breakdown, McCain took 51 percent of the Texas vote, Mike Huckabee with 38 percent of the vote. And then we move on now to Ohio where McCain won 60 percent of the GOP vote to Mike Huckabee's 31 percent. And John McCain now has 1,226 delegates. There you see the count. He -- that's 35 more than he needed to statistically clinch the nomination. Mike Huckabee finished with 251. McCain states are in red, as you can see they take up most of the map. You have -- Huckabee's in pink and the maroon states are Mitt Romney's.

McCain right now emerges as the leader of the GOP and today he heads to the White House to get President Bush's endorsement. McCain is now looking ahead to November and taking on the Democrats.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Americans aren't interested in an election where they just talk to and not listen to. An election...

(APPLAUSE)

MCCAIN: An election that offers platitudes instead of principles and insults instead of ideas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: Mike Huckabee conceded the race to McCain soon after the polls close, thanking his supporters and talking about the high tone of his campaign and the importance of sticking to his principles and of staying in the race to give voice to his constituents. And then he threw his support behind McCain.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE HUCKABEE (R), FMR. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's now important that we turn our attention not to what could have been or what we wanted to have been but what now must be, and that is a united party but a party that indeed comes together on those principles that have brought many of us, not just to this race but to politics in general.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: Huckabee says he has no plan B for his future. Texas Congressman Ron Paul, though, still in the race with 21 delegates.

ROBERTS: So while Senator John McCain locks up the Republican nomination, the Democrats dig in for what has once again become a wide open race.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTS (voice over): Just like her husband in 1992, Hillary Clinton is the comeback kid.

CLINTON: You know what they say, as Ohio goes, so goes the nation. Well, this nation's coming back and so is this campaign.

ROBERTS: After Barack Obama extended his winning streak to 12, thanks to an early evening slam dunk in Vermont, Clinton stormed back. The senator from New York won big in Rhode Island and Ohio, and edged out Obama in the make-or-break Texas primary.

CLINTON: We're going strong and we're going all the way.

ROBERTS: But Texas's complicated system also includes a post- primary caucus. And when all the counting is finally done, the candidates will probably come out almost even in that all important delegate count.

OBAMA: And we know this, no matter what happens tonight, matter what happens tonight, we have nearly the same delegate lead as we did this morning and we are on our way to winning this nomination.

ROBERTS: In the Republican battle, it was a clean sweep in all four states for John McCain, more than enough to put him over the top and clinch the nomination.

MCCAIN: We have won enough delegates to claim with confidence, humility and a great sense of responsibility that I will be the Republican nominee for president of the United States.

ROBERTS: The senator from Arizona thanked his main rival for a campaign well fought.

MCCAIN: All of us want to again commend my friend Governor Mike Huckabee, who's a great and fine and decent American, and we appreciate it. We appreciate...

(APPLAUSE)

We appreciate the campaign he ran. His supporters, for their passion and commitment to their campaign that Governor Huckabee so ably represented.

ROBERTS: True to his word, the former Arkansas governor announced he was done, congratulated McCain and pledged his help.

HUCKABEE: I send in to him not only my congratulations but my commitment to him and to the party to do everything possible to unite our party, but more importantly to unite our country.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTS: So the Republicans are now on to a national campaign, and for the Democrats, it's on to the next contest, the state of Wyoming now three days away -- Kiran? CHETRY: And that Democratic race may now be closer than ever.

Mark Halperin, the senior political analyst at "TIME" magazine, the author of "The Undecided Voter's Guide to the Next President." He joins us this morning, bright and early with us.

Good to see you this morning.

MARK HALPERIN, SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST, TIME: Great to be here.

CHETRY: Let's talk about Hillary Clinton's wins. She won both Texas and Ohio, something that everybody called must-win for her including her husband, the former president. But in Texas, it was 51 percent to 48 percent and they split the delegates. So really, how much does that win matter?

HALPERIN: Well, look, her audience now is the American people broadly, the press corps, which would have demanded her (INAUDIBLE) that she get out of the race if she hadn't won those states, and probably most important, those Democratic superdelegates. She needs those superdelegates to win the nomination. She cannot overtake Barack Obama in the elected delegates.

The question is: will they look at those two wins in big states and say, you know what? We're going to give her a chance to go forward. We're not going to get on the Obama bandwagon.

CHETRY: She made much of the fact that she won Ohio and that's a bellwether state for the president, saying that no recent nominee has not won Ohio in the primary and had gone up to win the White House. This is a year, though, where it's very hard to look at conventional wisdom and say that that's sort of what's going to decide this race. So how important was her Ohio win?

HALPERIN: I think it's symbolically important.

Look, all that really matters is delegates. Both campaigns have talking points on both sides. Obama's won more popular votes nationally, he's won more states. She has the stalking point. She's won almost all of the big states, the very biggest industrial states, the one that are going to make up any electoral (INAUDIBLE) victory. That's an interesting talking point. It doesn't help her with delegates but it may help her persuade some of those superdelegates to say, huh, why didn't Obama spending more -- spending a lot of time in Ohio and Texas, why didn't he win those states? And again, that may buy her the time she needs.

CHETRY: Is that why because Hillary Clinton went negative both with the 3:00 a.m. and then some of the other stories that surfaced regarding NAFTA, as well as some other questions about this developer that he had ties to.

HALPERIN: Right. Well, Obama ran a negative radio ad as well. Both campaigns are plenty negative when they want to be. I think you saw in the last four days, she drove the kind of message she wanted to drive, a contrast message with Obama, particularly on national security and has questioned his greatest vulnerability of readiness.

One of the many reasons she wants to stay in this race now, emboldened by her wins, is to say, look, I had three days where I drove that message, where people were contrasting us, and the press was going after Obama more aggressively, she'd like to keep that going.

CHETRY: Well, how much did that hurt him, because it seems that it was the first time in -- since this -- since he's caught fire that we have seen a pretty spirited back and forth between Barack Obama and the press especially over this Canadian-NAFTA issue. How much did that hurt him in Ohio?

HALPERIN: Overnight I was not able to get into the minds with Ohio voters as definitively. But intuitively, based on the flow of the campaign, what the exit poll says about the late-deciders and how off his game he was for a variety of reasons, the NAFTA thing, the Tony Rezko trial, his former associate in Chicago, the ad against him on national security. I think it did hurt and I think he's going to have to show, again, not just the American people and the press, but those superdelegates that he can come back and be more of the Barack Obama who won all those contests in February.

CHETRY: Where do you stand on whether or not it hurts the Democratic Party in general by having this go further and possibly all the way in the convention?

HALPERIN: I'm a little bit more on the side that says it's not that big a deal as long as it's handled well. One of these two will be the nominee, whoever it is, Obama or Clinton, still more likely Obama, needs to bring the party back together, needs to go to the supporters of the person who loses and say, we need to win as a united party.

If they don't handle it well, it will hurt but I think they probably will handle it OK.

CHETRY: Mark Halperin, great to see you. Thanks.

HALPERIN: Thanks.

CHETRY: And Senators Clinton and Obama are both joining us right here on AMERICAN MORNING. We're going to speak to Barack Obama at 7:15 Eastern Time. And right after that, Hillary Clinton will be joining us as well.

ROBERTS: How much of a role did this red phone ad play in Hillary Clinton's victory in Texas? Bill Schneider will break down the exit polls for us, coming up next on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROBERTS: Forty-five minutes after the hour. Some strong late campaigning may have pushed Hillary Clinton over the top in Texas.

Our senior political analyst Bill Schneider joins us now with a look at this late-deciding voters and how they cast their ballots.

You know, we saw these polls in Texas favoring Barack Obama and then certainly in the last couple of days, everything turned around. How is that reflected in the polls?

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, we asked people, when did you decide how you intended to vote? And among Texas Democrats who decided in the last three days. The last three days, Clinton has a strong lead, 61 to 38, over Barack Obama. Among everyone else who decided more than three days before the primary, the race was just about a dead heat.

ROBERTS: Yes.

SCHNEIDER: So Clinton clearly built her margin in the last three days.

ROBERTS: Yes.

SCHNEIDER: There is going to be a lot of discussion. The red phone ad was run in Texas. She ran that ad warning voters if the red phone rings at 3:00 a.m. do you trust Barack Obama or me to be responsible as commander in chief? That ad may have been responsible for that late, late, surge.

ROBERTS: So this is why we saw the numbers changed so dramatically from the early results. It's been a lot of that early voting was coming in and then as all the precincts came in...

SCHNEIDER: Yes.

ROBERTS: ...he had a -- not substantially, but he was in the lead when the early votes came in, and then she started to swing into the lead after that as all the precincts came in, all those late- deciders.

SCHNEIDER: That's right. It was the late-deciders. What the ad had to do with it, that's going to be debated and analyzed, I think, a great deal. But that's what we know, that the late-deciders went heavily for Hillary Clinton.

ROBERTS: What about the age of voters? How did that breakdown?

SCHNEIDER: Well, same thing sort of was interesting there. Among all the voters below seniors, that is 18 to 64, that's a lot of people, the race was a dead heat. So what put Hillary Clinton over the top in this case? Seniors, 67 to 30, more than two to one, seniors voted for Hillary Clinton. A very big and important constituency. She's gotten seniors throughout the primaries. She got them in Texas. They're the one who really put her over.

ROBERTS: And there are people who come out to vote as well, right?

SCHNEIDER: They do come out to vote. I think young people came out to vote this time, too, and the young people are whelming for Obama. One of the most important things we've seen in primary after primary is the vote is a direct function of age. The older you are the more likely you are to vote for Clinton, the younger you are the more likely you are to vote for Obama. But in this case, it was the seniors that really made the difference for Hillary Clinton.

ROBERTS: Now, of course, on the Republican side of things, John McCain clinched it last night, went over the top, went over the 1,191 that he needed. Looking at the race going forward, what do we learn from the Texas results?

SCHNEIDER: That he is making headway with conservative voters. He hasn't quite won them all over yet. Take a look at the conservative voters in the Republican primary in Texas.

If you were somewhat conservative, which 40 percent of the Republicans were, you voted for John McCain. That's where he made headway. He carried the majority of those voters. But among the one- third of Republicans who call themselves very conservative, they're still holding back. They voted 50 percent for Mike Huckabee, 38 for McCain. So there's still a faction of conservatives, a very conservative voters, who aren't quite ready even now to support John McCain.

ROBERTS: We'll see if Mike Huckabee now throwing his support behind John McCain changes that equation.

SCHNEIDER: And George Bush.

ROBERTS: Yes -- looking forward to that later on today, too.

SCHNEIDER: Yes.

ROBERTS: Bill Schneider for us this morning. Thanks. And Bill is going to be back coming up in our next hour with a look at how the economy affected voters' decision -- Kiran?

CHETRY: Well, after last night's sweep, John McCain no longer has to worry about the Republican nomination anymore. He is now aiming at a national audience.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCCAIN: Nothing, nothing, nothing is inevitable in America. We are the captains of our faith. We are not a country that prefers nostalgia to optimism, a country that would rather go back than forward. We're the world's leader and leaders don't (INAUDIBLE) for the past and dread the future. We make the future better than the past. We don't hide from history, we make history. That, my friends, is the essence of hope in America. Hope built on courage and the faith and the values and principles that have made us great.

I intend to make my stand on those principles and chart a course for our future greatness and trust and trust in the judgment of the people I have served all my life. So stand up with me, my friends, stand up and fight for America, for her strength, her ideals and her future, the contest begins tonight. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: And John McCain is going to be getting President Bush's endorsement later today.

Well, Hillary Clinton certainly made a big comeback last night. She seems to have found a message that works. We're going to hear her reaction to the victories ahead.

And with the price of oil driving the economy, OPEC ministers getting ready to make the call on how much they will pump out of the ground and how it will affect your gas prices. That's also ahead in AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROBERTS: It's coming up on seven minutes to the top of the hour now. Welcome back to the most politics in the morning.

Hillary Clinton fresh off her first three wins since Super Tuesday is going forward with the themes that helped her make last night's dramatic comeback.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: This is a great night. But we all know that these are challenging time. We have two wars abroad. We have a recession looming here at home. Voters face a critical question: who is tested and ready to be commander in chief on day one? And who knows how to turn our economy around because we sure do need it.

Ohio has written a new chapter in the history of this campaign and we're just getting started. More and more people have joined this campaign and millions of Americans haven't spoken yet. In states like Pennsylvania and so many others, people are watching this historic campaign and they want their turn to help make history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Hillary Clinton, by the way, is going to be joining us in our 7:00 hour, 7:15 Eastern, so if you can be in front of a television set somewhere, if you're getting up, heading into work, make sure that you are because we are going to speak with her bout the race will shape up going forward and hear what she has to say about the wins last night.

CHETRY: Well, some wet weather also moving across parts of the country today. There's sleet and snow. It closed down schools in Arkansas. Eleven inches of snow fell in Russellville. That's a beautiful picture for a Christmas card but not fun if you have to travel. This is northwest of Little Rock. And that same system is also causing problems in Ohio.

Jacqui Jeras in for Rob Marciano tracking the extreme weather for us. In fact, weather playing a big role yesterday for some of the voters especially the after-work crowd trying to get in there yesterday.

(WEATHER REPORT)

CHETRY: All right. Thanks a lot, Jacqui.

ROBERTS: Well, voters seem to be looking for a candidate who can fix the economy. Is that good news for Hillary Clinton?

Ali Velshi with more on that just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTS: Staying alive.

CLINTON: Thank you, Ohio.

ROBERTS: Hillary Clinton wins three of four, but Obama holds the line.

OBAMA: We are on our way to winning this nomination.

ROBERTS: Both join us live this morning.

Magic numbers.

MCCAIN: I will be the Republican nominee for president of the United States.

ROBERTS: John McCain clinches and heads to the White House for a presidential endorsement today.

The most politics in the morning on this AMERICAN MORNING.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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