Hillary Clinton on Sunday sailed to victory in the Democratic primary in Puerto Rico, easily defeating rival Sen. Bernie Sanders and scooping up most of the territory’s 60 delegates.
CNN projected the victory via Twitter at 9:40 pm ET. Clinton was ahead by about a two to one margin in early voting.
The win puts Clinton on the cusp of gaining the 2,383 total delegates she needs to become the presumptive nominee. However, she will have to wait until June 7, when the final Democratic primaries are held and Clinton will go over the top.
Nevertheless, Sen. Bernie Sanders has vowed to fight on to the convention in July, saying that Clinton must rely on “superdelegates” to be the victor and vowing to convince those delegates to change their votes. Sanders, who Sunday said there would be a “contested convention,” hopes to win in California in order to be able to make a stronger case to delegates to flip their support to him. Polls there currently show the race is about even.
There were reports of voters waiting hours to cast a ballot after the number of voting stations was cut drastically last month.
Both candidates pledged to help Puerto Rico restructure its $70 billion in debt, which the island’s governor says it cannot pay.
Clinton also scored a sweeping victory Saturday in the Virgin Islands, picking up all seven of the delegates there. She entered the Sunday’s primary 60 delegates short of the number needed for the nomination, but she won’t seize all 60 delegates in play in Puerto Rico.
Clinton also handily defeated then-Sen. Barack Obama in Puerto Rico in 2008.
