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Bush camp claims victory
03/11/2004 13:16 - (SA)
Washington - President George W Bush crept close to re-election early on Wednesday (US time), leading challenger John Kerry in a campaign cliffhanger. The state of Ohio, where results were too close to call, held the key, stirring echoes of Florida in 2000 - but this time Bush's advantage was substantial.
With a majority of the popular vote in hand, the Republican president planned to declare victory on Wednesday.
"We are convinced that President Bush has won re-election," White House chief of staff Andrew Card said shortly before dawn on the US East Coast.
Kerry went to bed without conceding. "We will fight for every vote," his running mate, Senator John Edwards, told supporters in Boston, where he and the four-term Massachusetts senator waited out the late, long count.
After winning Nevada in the wee hours Wednesday, Bush had 254 electoral votes, 16 shy of the 270 required for a second term. Kerry stalled at 252 electoral votes after narrowly winning Wisconsin.
Whichever candidate captures Ohio, with its 20 electoral votes, wins the presidency.
As Bush made plans to declare victory, his high command dispatched a 10-person political and legal team to Ohio in the event Kerry triggered a Florida-like fight. Card said Bush delayed his own public statement to "give Senator Kerry the respect of more time to reflect on the results of this election."
That was a veiled request for Kerry to bow out gracefully, and avoid the rancor that accompanied a 36-day recount in Florida four years ago.
That margin was small, but Bush's lead in Ohio is substantial - Card called it "statistically insurmountable, even after provisional ballots are considered."
With Bush leading in Ohio by 145 000 votes and roughly 190 000 yet to be counted, one top Kerry adviser said the Democrat's chances of winning the state, and with it the White House, were difficult at best.
Card said Bush not only won a second term but Republicans added "to our majority in the House and ... to our majority in the Senate."
Republicans expanded their majority in the 100-seat Senate, knocking off Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota, and extended their decade-long hold on the 435-seat House of Representatives for another two years.
- AP
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