Obama beats Clinton in Rappahannock County and all Virginia; McCain wins a close race over Huckabee
Sen. Barack Obama easily won the Democratic presidential primary race in Rappahannock County as he piled up a huge win over Sen. Hillary Clinton across Virginia Tuesday evening.
In the county, the Illinois senator received 774 votes or 59.5% of the total, to Clinton’s 515 votes or 39.6%.
Statewide, with 93% of Virginia’s 2,472 precincts reporting, Obama was winning by a wide margin over Clinton, with 578,327 votes, or 63.6%, to her 321,673, or 35.4%.
In the Republican primary, McCain won a somewhat closer contest over challenger Mike Huckabee. With 93% of Virginia’s precincts reporting, McCain had 224,699 votes or 50.9% of the total, to Huckabee’s 175,572 or 39.8%. Ron Paul won 20,848 votes or 4.7%.
McCain won Rappahannock County with 375 votes or 52.8% of the total. Huckabee ran second with 258 votes or 36.3%. Ron Paul finished third in the county with 48 votes or 6.7%. There was a scattering of votes for candidates who had dropped out of the race: 21 for Mitt Romney, five for Fred Thompson and three for Rudy Giuliani.
Rappahannock voters also scattered a handful of votes among also-rans who left the race, including five votes for John Edwards, five for Dennis Kucinich, and one vote for Joe Biden.
Voter turnout was far higher in the Democratic primary than in the GOP contest. Statewide, with about 93% of precincts reporting, 908,607 voters participated in the Democratic primary, compared with 441,637 voters in the Republican primary. The Democratic turnout represented about 19.7% of the state’s eligible voters, while the GOP turnout was about 9.6% of the total.
In Rappahannock County, 1,300 voters participated in the Democratic primary, compared to 710 voting in the Republican primary. The Democratic turnout represented 24% of the county’s eligible voters, and the GOP turnout represented 13.1% of the total.
Within Rappahannock County, Obama won all six voting precincts in the Democratic primary–Amissville, Chester Gap, Flint Hill, Scrabble, Sperryville and Washington. In the GOP primary, McCain also scored a clean sweep of all six precincts.
-- James P. Gannon
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