Race to White House: Trump triumphs in New Hampshire, Sanders defeats Hillary

Hillary Clinton was on Wednesday handed out a shocking defeat by her Democratic rival Bernie Sanders in the New Hampshire primary while controversial Donald Trump solidified his frontrunner status in the Republican party by registering a thumping victory in the race to the White House.

Vermont Senator Sanders, 74, won the New Hampshire contest after Clinton conceded defeat. Sanders received 60 per cent of the votes as against 38 per cent by 68-year-old former secretary of state.

Trump, 69, whose blunt language targeting women, Mexicans and Muslims electrified many Republicans and horrified others, defeated his nearest rival John Kasich, Governor of Ohio, by a huge margin of more than 50,000 votes.

He benefited from an unusually large field of candidates that split the vote among Kasich and former Governor Jeb Bush of Florida. Trump, a reality TV star who has never run for office, and Sanders, a self-declared democratic socialist, were seen as long-shot outsiders when they launched their campaigns. Both candidates are riding on a wave of discontent with mainstream politics. “Their victories reflect deep bipartisan discontent at professional politicians and suggest that both the Democratic and Republican races will now be long struggles that could stretch well into the spring,” CNN commented. New Hampshire delivered a painful personal blow to Clinton, who squeezed out the narrowest of victories in Iowa last week. New Hampshire is the state that made her husband Bill Clinton the “comeback kid” in 1992. She had won in New Hampshire eight years ago against US President Barack Obama. Sanders described his win as “political revolution” while Clinton said that she is not giving up. Clinton acknowledged that when she started her campaign last spring she knew that it is not going to be easy. “Here’s what we are going to do. Now we take this campaign to the entire country. We are going to fight for every vote in every State. We are going to fight for real solutions that make a real difference in people’s lives,” Clinton said, with her husband Bill standing by her side.