Democrat Senator Barack Obama won most of the votes from women, blacks and Hispanics and siphoned off enough white support to leave Republican Senator John McCain with no way to win.
Exit polls showed that McCain won the votes of 55 percent of white voters, whose strong support has been vital to the success of winning Republican presidential candidates. But he did not get a wide enough margin to compensate for the lopsided support that Obama drew from other voters who make up a quarter of the electorate.
McCain and Obama split whites across the US except in the South, where McCain got twice as many white votes as Obama. Southern whites had favored Republican President George W. Bush by similar margins in his 2000 and 2004 wins.
Obama, who will become the first black president and at age 47 one of the youngest, ran away with the youth vote. He won the under-30 crowd by 34 percentage points, even better than Democrat Bill Clinton’s 19-point advantage when he defeated Bob Dole in 1996.
He was the choice of nearly seven in 10 first-time voters of all ages.
Forty percent of those voting called themselves Democrats — a historically high number — and they overwhelmingly chose Obama. He also held a significant edge among the quarter of voters who called themselves independents.
McCain, 72, was the choice of just over half of senior citizens, coveted for their vigilance in going to the polls. Those 65 years and older were 16 percent of all voters, similar in influence to people under 30.
McCain drew some of his strongest support from white, working-class voters, winning 58 percent of their vote. But it was shy of the 23-point margin by which Bush won the votes of whites without a college degree in 2004.
Enthusiasm clearly was on Obama’s side: Almost six in 10 of his voters said they were excited about what Obama would do as president. Fewer than three in 10 McCain voters felt that way about their man, according to the exit polls.
Curt Babura, a 31-year-old cook from Cleveland, said he never bothered to vote before casting his ballot for Obama.
“When he talks it feels like he’s talking to you,” Babura said.
Obama drew the votes of two-thirds of Hispanic voters — heavily courted by both candidates — and 95 percent of blacks who went to the polls.
A healthy lead among women voters typically is key to a Democratic presidential victory, and Obama attracted 56 percent of their votes. He split the overall male vote with McCain.
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