(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-03-05 13:45

She still faces a sizable deficit to Obama in delegates to the August nominating convention, and appeared unlikely to close the gap significantly on Tuesday unless she wound up with big winning margins in Ohio and Texas.

Clinton led Obama slightly, 50 percent to 48 percent, with about 55 percent of the precincts counted in Texas.

'ON OUR WAY TO WINNING'

"No matter what happens tonight we have nearly the same delegate lead we did this morning, and we are on our way to winning this nomination," Obama told his supporters in San Antonio, Texas.

Republican US presidential candidate Senator John McCain (L) (R-AZ) and his wife Cindy arrive at his Ohio and Texas primary election night rally in Dallas, Texas March 4, 2008. McCain won the Republican nomination. [Agencies]

Under Democratic rules allowing the losers in each state to win a proportional amount of delegates, Clinton must win many of the remaining contests by big margins to close the delegate gap.

An MSNBC count gave Obama 1,194 delegates to Clinton's 1,037 before Tuesday's showdowns, well short of the 2,025 needed to win the nomination.

Clinton also captured Rhode Island and Obama scored an easy win in Vermont. Turnout was heavy in all four states, and the Democratic campaigns of Obama, 46, an Illinois senator, and Clinton traded accusations of irregularities at the polls in both Ohio and Texas.

Like her husband, former President Bill Clinton, who nicknamed himself "The Comeback Kid" for his improbable rise to the White House in 1992, Clinton has dodged disaster before.

In January, Obama appeared ready to deal her a knockout blow in New Hampshire after his big win in Iowa, but she defied opinion polls and won.

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After a landslide loss in South Carolina, Clinton battled Obama to a draw in Super Tuesday contests around the country on February 5, winning some of the biggest prizes of the night in California, New York and New Jersey.

In his victory speech, McCain took aim at both of his likely Democratic opponents and criticized their pledges to revisit U.S. trade treaties, punish companies that send jobs overseas and withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq.

"The next president must explain how he or she intends to bring that war to the swiftest possible conclusion without exacerbating a sectarian conflict that could quickly descend into genocide, destabilizing the entire Middle East," said McCain, who received a call of congratulations from Obama.

McCain has had trouble winning over conservatives unhappy with his views on immigration, his past opposition to Bush's tax cuts in 2001 and 2003, and his criticism of some religious conservative leaders as "agents of intolerance" during his failed 2000 presidential campaign.

Huckabee said he called McCain to congratulate him and promised to actively back his candidacy and rally support among Republicans. "I will do everything possible to unite our party," Huckabee told supporters in Irving, Texas.

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