Washington: Barack Obama swept Democratic presidential contests in three US states on Saturday, striking the latest blows in a bruising back-and-forth battle with Hillary Clinton for the party's nomination.
Obama cruised to decisive wins in Louisiana, Nebraska and Washington to gain momentum in a deadlocked, state-by-state fight with Clinton where every delegate to the party's summer convention has become crucial.
"Today, the voters from the West Coast to the Gulf Coast to the heart of America stood up to say yes, we can," Obama said at a party dinner in Richmond, Virginia, a state that votes on Tuesday.
"We won in Louisiana, we won in Nebraska, we won in Washington state, we won North, we won South, we won in between, and I believe that we can win Virginia on Tuesday if you're ready to stand for change," the Illinois senator said.
Among Republicans, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee easily won the presidential contest in Kansas, showing signs of life in a nominating race front-runner John McCain has nearly sewed up.
Huckabee and McCain were running close in partial returns in Louisiana and Washington, which also voted on Saturday in the Republican race to choose a candidate in November's presidential election.
Huckabee, whose campaign has been fueled by support from social and religious conservatives, captured about 60 percent of the vote in Kansas, more than double McCain's total.
"This race is far from being over," Huckabee told reporters after crushing McCain in Kansas, just two days after the Arizona senator became the all-but-certain nominee with the withdrawal of his chief rival, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney.
Republican contest
Huckabee is now the only major opponent for McCain, who has rolled up more than 700 of the 1,191 delegates needed to win the Republican nomination at this summer's convention.
Texas Republican Ron Paul also remains in the race. Obama cruised to easy wins in Nebraska and Washington, doubling Clinton's tally with more than 60 percent of the vote in partial returns, and he was comfortably ahead of Clinton in Louisiana. Obama also won in the US territory of the Virgin Islands, which has three delegates to the nominating convention.
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Clinton, a New York senator, and Obama, an Illinois senator, are about even in pledged delegates but well short of the 2,025 needed to win the nomination.
Democratic rules allocate delegates on a proportional basis statewide and in congressional districts, meaning even the loser in each state can win big blocks of delegates. It was not immediately clear how the delegate count would break down in the three states, where a combined 158 convention delegates were at stake.
Obama, who would be the first black US president, had been the favorite in all three contests. In Louisiana, he had been expected to benefit from a high percentage of black voters, his strongest supporters.
Exit polls showed blacks made up about half of the turnout in the state on Saturday, and Obama won four of every five of their votes. Clinton captured about 70 percent of whites, with Obama taking about one-quarter of their vote.
The contests in Nebraska and Washington were caucuses, which require voters to turn out at specific times. Obama had focused on caucus states, which play to his strength by favoring strong organizations and grass-roots enthusiasm.
In the Republican race, McCain still faces widespread opposition from conservatives unhappy with his views on immigration, tax cuts and other issues.
Huckabee's win in Kansas, one of the most reliably Republican states in the country, appeared to underscore McCain's problem. Huckabee promised at a conference of conservative activists in Washington to continue his shoestring campaign at least until McCain clinched the nomination.
"I know that I won't drop out until at least that happens and then we'll see," he told reporters, denying he was hoping to become McCain's vice-presidential running mate. Huckabee also shrugged off a call from Texas Gov.
Rick Perry, a McCain supporter, urging him to drop out. "I did not major in math, but I majored in miracles, and I still believe in them," Huckabee said at a rally at the University of Maryland in College Park.
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