New York primaries as it happened: Trump and Clinton clinch victories in their home state
- The remaining five candidates are hoping to take home several delegates from the New York primary on 19 April.
- Recent polls revealed Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump were poised to win big tonight and they did. However, Democrat Bernie Sanders and Republican John Kasich could also take home a significant number of delegates.
- Delegate counts prior to the primaries are: Clinton 1,758 and Sanders 1,076 for Democrats; Trump 756, Ted Cruz 559 and Kasich 144 for the GOP.
While our readers will be able to follow the results here on our blog, New York City voters will get the results via LED display on the Empire State Building thanks to CNN. Each candidate will be represented by a different colour. Hillary Clinton will be a dark blue, while Bernie Sanders will be a light blue. On the GOP side, Donald Trump will be crimson red, Ted Cruz will be a coral red and John Kaiser a purple.
There have been reports of voting irregularities in New York City, prompting condemnation from the Sanders campaign. Board of Elections officials confirmed that more than125,000 Democratic voters had been removed from the rolls.
"From long lines and dramatic understaffing to longtime voters being forced to cast affidavit ballots and thousands of registered New Yorkers being dropped from the rolls, what's happening today is a disgrace," Sanders spokesman Karthik Ganapathy told reporters.
New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio, who is supporting Sanders' rival Hillary Clinton, called for reforms to the Board of Elections.
"It has been reported to us from voters and voting rights monitors that the voting lists in Brooklyn contain numerous errors, including the purging of entire buildings and blocks of voters from the voting lists," the mayor said in a statement. He added: "The perception that numerous voters may have been disenfranchised undermines the integrity of the entire electoral process and must be fixed."
Board of Elections Executive Director Michael Ryan hit back against criticisms saying, "We're not finding that there were issues throughout the city that are any different than what we experience in other elections."
h/t CNN
Breaking down the recent polls: Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were up ahead in polls released by Emerson and CBS News/YouGov in the past few days. How well did they do?
Emerson (17 April):
- Republicans: Trump 55%, Kasich 21% and Cruz 18%
- Democrats: Clinton 55% and Sanders 40%
CBS News/YouGov (15 April):
- Republicans: Trump 54%, Cruz 21% and Kasich 19%
- Democrats: Clinton 53% and Sanders 43%
Welcome to our live coverage of the Republican and Democratic primaries in New York. Voters throughout the Empire State have at least two more hours to head to the polling stations to cast their ballots. Delegates in both parties will be awarded proportionally, which spells good news for all candidates involved. However, polls prior to the primaries revealed Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump were firmly in the lead.
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