By ,
Published December 01, 2016
As expected, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton dominated on Super Tuesday.
But Sen. Ted Cruz scored important wins in Oklahoma and his home state of Texas, which has 155 delegates, and which he won by a 16-point-lead over Trump. While, Marco Rubio won his only state in this election, the Minnesota caucus.
Trump was declared the winner in Georgia, Alabama, Virginia, Tennessee, Arkansas, Massachusetts, and Vermont. Clinton was declared the winner in Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, Virginia, and Massachusetts.
Clinton extended her lead over Democratic rival Bernie Sanders, who won his home state of Vermont, as well as Oklahoma, Colorado and Minnesota, but failed to broaden his appeal with minority voters who are crucial to the party in presidential elections.
Both Clinton and Cruz won the biggest delegate prize of the night, Texas, in part, thanks to the Hispanic vote. Clinton won 71 percent of the Hispanic vote and Sanders won just 29 percent while Cruz won 35 percent of the Latino vote.
The night belonged to Trump and Clinton, who turned the busiest day of the 2016 primaries into a showcase of their strength with a wide swath of American voters.
Signaling her confidence, Clinton set her sights on Trump as she addressed supporters during a victory rally.
“We know we got work to do,” she declared. “But that work, that work, is not to make America great again. America never stopped being great. We have to make America whole.”
"It's clear tonight that the stakes in this election have never been higher and the rhetoric we're hearing on the other side has never been lower," she said.
She went on to explain, “What I believe we need in America today is more love and kindness.”
Trump, too, had his eye on a general election match-up with the former secretary of state, casting her as part of a political establishment that has failed Americans.
"She's been there for so long," Trump said at his swanky Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. "If she hasn't straightened it out by now, she's not going to straighten it out in the next four years."
Trump, who chose to have a press-conference rather than a rally in what appeared to be a move to look more presidential, declared that he was the unifier of the Republican Party.
“I would love to see the Republican Party and everybody get together and unify,” he said. “And when we unify, there is nobody, nobody that is going to beat us.”
For Rubio, Super Tuesday turned into a disappointment. He emerged with his first victory in Minnesota but failed to live up to the wider hopes of the numerous Republican officeholders who have promoted him as the party's best alternative to Trump.
With an eye on Florida's March 15 primary, Rubio vowed to keep up efforts to "unmask the true nature of the front-runner in this race."
In an interview with Fox News on Tuesday night, Rubio downplayed the Super Tuesday results.
“When we’re done here in Florida, we’ll win Florida, and we’ll win other winner-take-all states,” Rubio said on Tuesday night. “That’s when we’re really going to take off. We’re not going to turn over the party of Lincoln and Reagan” to Trump.
Cruz desperately needed his win in Texas in order to stay in the race. He's the only Republican to beat Trump this primary season, a fact he wielded as he called on Rubio and other candidates to step aside.
"I ask you to prayerfully consider our coming together, united," Cruz said.
But Rubio has vowed to fight to the end.
"This is going to be a long campaign," his campaign said in an e-mail to supporters. "And we are not going to hand over our party to a dangerous con artist."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/donald-trump-and-hillary-clinton-dominate-on-super-tuesday