Oregon chooses Sanders

In a hard-fought victory that likely came too little, too late — but still buoyed by his millions of supporters nationwide — Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders won the Oregon Democratic primary over rival Hillary Clinton on Tuesday.

Sanders had about 52 percent of the vote to 46 percent for Clinton with results still being counted late Tuesday.

Sanders may have gotten a boost from the three rallies he held in the state, including one in Springfield on April 28, while Clinton did not put in an Oregon appearance.

In Lane County, Sanders dominated Clinton even more, with about 58 percent of the vote to Clinton’s 41 percent in unofficial results.

“We’re pretty excited about the results so far, and we’re just going to keep waiting,” said Monte Jarvis, state director of the Sanders Oregon campaign, speaking from campaign headquarters in Portland before the race was officially called.

Local supporters in Eugene held a victory party at Cozmic downtown, with Sanders fans holding up letters that spelled B-E-R-N-I-E as they partied late into the night.

“This is a great opportunity to celebrate democracy and celebrate who’s actually fighting for us,” said Matt Keating, local campaign coordinator in Eugene for Sanders.

Meanwhile, presumptive Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump easily won the Oregon primary as expected — with about 65 percent of the vote as of late Tuesday — against two challengers, Ted Cruz and John Kasich, who already had dropped out of the race.

Lane County Sanders supporters have been meeting at Cozmic every weekend for a year to gather steam for the populist candidate’s campaign,

“It’s nice to see it come full circle right back here,” Keating said, celebrating in the middle of about 200 Sanders’ supporters.

Oregon’s 61 Democratic delegates will be divided proportionately among Sanders and Clinton.

Clinton apparently squeaked out a close victory in the Kentucky Democratic primary, also held on Tuesday, with returns showing her leading Sanders by the slimmest of margins, 46.7 percent to 46.3 percent, in a race some were saying was too close to call. The two candidates will likely split Kentucky’s 55 Democratic delegates.

Sanders still will need a finish of somewhat miraculous proportions to overtake Clinton, with just a few primaries — including the biggest, in California on June 7 — remaining to win the Democratic nomination.

Few, outside of Sanders’ supporters, believe he can do it.

“It is theoretically possible, just as it is theoretically possible to drive from Los Angeles to San Francisco in less than two hours — provided you go 200 mph the entire way,” Los Angeles Times’ political reporter Mark Barabek wrote on Monday.

Sanders would need to win close to 90 percent of the remaining delegates to overtake Clinton.

Speaking at a rally Tuesday night in Carson, Calif., Sanders said: “There are a lot of people out there, many of the pundits and politicians, they say, ‘Bernie Sanders should drop out. The people of California should not have the right to determine who the next president will be.’

“Well, let me be as clear as I can be,” he continued, “We are in ’til the last ballot is cast.”

Clinton came into Tuesday’s primaries with a large pledged delegate lead over Sanders of 1,716 to 1,433, and now has 1,767 pledged delegates to 1,488 for Sanders, according to the Associated Press.

“It’s mathematically possible (for Sanders to win), but not realistic, given that Democrats award delegates on a proportional, rather than winner-take-all, basis,” Barabek wrote.

Trump’s win in Oregon provides him with a few more delegates as he closes in on the 1,243 needed to secure the GOP nomination. He is now just 77 delegates short, according to the AP.

“We’re going to win tonight,” said Jacob Daniels, 30, a former Creswell city councilor and now state director for the Trump campaign in Oregon, speaking in the warm sunshine outside Trump’s west Eugene campaign headquarters about 6 p.m. Tuesday.

About 100 supporters mingled and ate pizza and readied to dive into a red, white and blue cake that said “Make America Great Again — Trump 2016.”

It was two hours before any results would come in, but a Trump victory was a foregone conclusion. Daniels predicted Trump would get 65 percent of the vote and he was spot-on.

“I’m confident we will bring in 65 percent tonight, but my goal is 75 percent,” Daniels said.

Trump, who had garnered about 66 percent of the vote among Lane County GOP voters late Tuesday, made his only Oregon appearance this primary season on May 6 in Eugene, where a raucous crowd of about 4,400 greeted him at the Lane Events Center.

Follow Mark on Twitter @MarkBakerRG . Email [email protected] .