BYU NewsNet - Romney, Obama win Utah Primary

This year, the Utah vote mattered.

After all the last minute candidate pleas and visits and record high Democratic voter turn out, Sen. Barack Obama won the majority of Utah's 23 Democratic delegates. Former Gov. Mitt Romney easily won the Republican Party's 36 delegates as expected.

Obama's victory came after a long struggle in the polls with Sen. Hillary Clinton. The two candidates were within 10 percent of each other in several state polls including Connecticut and New Jersey. Even Clinton's home state New York gave 40 percent of votes to Obama.

With such close primaries, Utah's additional delegates will be a welcome addition to Obama's 158 delegate total before Super Tuesday.

True to predictions, CNN exit polls reported the vast majority of Obama's Utah supporters were between 18 and 59. He also managed to claim more than 50 percent of Utah's women voters, a demographic Clinton's campaign was aiming to reach.

Despite the still close race, Obama spoke hopefully of these results from campaign headquarters in Chicago Tuesday night.

"Our time has come," said Obama on CNN news. "Our moment is real, and change is coming to America."

The Illinois senator continued to reassure his supporters that he wanted to overcome divisions between parties, races and genders.

"We are more than a collection of red states and blue states," he said. "We are and always will be the United States of America."

Unlike the close Democratic primary, Romney won an easy victory with Utah voters. Most political analysts from the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and CNN cited Romney's victory to his religious connection with the predominantly Mormon state and his successful management of the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake. Consequently, no other Republican contender made major efforts to win Utah votes, which made Romney's win even more predictable.

But in a race when every delegate counts, Utah's 36 delegates will be a welcome addition to Romney's current 92.

Despite this Utah win, Romney is still far from securing the Republican nomination. Sen. John McCain carried several crucial states, including New York, and Sen. Mike Huckabee won in West Virginia and most of the South.

With a divided vote between three major candidates, most states had a narrow gap between first and second place. This gap is especially troubling for Romney, who did far worse than expected in many states Huckabee won.

But Romney was undeterred as he spoke to supporters from Boston Tuesday night.

"It's not all done tonight," said Romney on CNN news. "We expect a lot more delegates from a lot more states."

Romney continued his platform of economic change and said America needs "a president who's actually had a job in the private sector." Through controlling immigration and becoming less oil dependant, he promised to continue to "preserve the peace and prosperity" of previous generations.