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Bush wins big in three US primary polls

WASHINGTON: Texas Gov. George W. Bush halted the challenge of Arizona Sen. John McCain in its tracks Tuesday with three victories that put him back in control in the battle for the Republican presidential nomination.

Bush had been expected to beat McCain in the Virginia Republican primary and the North Dakota party caucuses. But a contest in the state of Washington had been expected to be close. In fact, Bush won comfortably there as well.

In the Democratic race, Vice President Al Gore dealt a devastating blow to former Sen. Bill Bradley, crushing him in a nonbinding vote in Washington where the former basketball star had made an all-out drive for victory.

Bush owed his win in Virginia to the support of Christian conservatives, who backed him by more than eight to one. Among non-religious voters, he ran about even with McCain.

Voters in the conservative southern state appeared to have reacted to McCain's hard-hitting speech, delivered the day before the primary, in which he branded two top Christian political figures as "agents of intolerance.

Bush, the eldest son of former President George Bush, needed to restore credibility as the Republican front-runner after McCain beat him in Michigan and Arizona a week before.

Now, Bush can go into next week's "Super Tuesday" contests with momentum, knowing that most loyal Republicans seem to support him.

McCain is getting most of his support from independent voters and Democrats, who will not be able to vote in many of the 12 states holding primaries and caucuses on Super Tuesday.

"Tonight in an open primary, by a solid majority ... the voters of Virginia rejected the politics of pitting one religion against another," Bush declared in Cincinnati, where he was campaigning for next Tuesday's Ohio primary.

ONE STEP CLOSER

"Tonight we are one step closer to victory; we are one step closer to having a united party and we are one step closer to getting rid of Clinton-Gore in Washington, D.C.," he said.

Other states holding primaries next Tuesday include California, New York, Massachusetts, Georgia and Missouri. Bush and McCain will meet in a debate on Thursday.

"We'll look forward to Super Tuesday, when we have a broad cross section of Americans all voting on that same day," McCain told reporters on his campaign bus.

The vote in Washington was significant for Democrats, despite the fact that no delegates were at stake. Bradley had spent the past five days in Washington looking for any kind of victory that might prompt Democratic voters to take another look at his candidacy.

But projections by TV networks suggested Gore trounced Bradley by 69-27 percent. Bradley may struggle on for another week until Super Tuesday but his prospects now look grim. He could end the campaign without winning a single state.

Exit polls showed that Bush won the Virginia vote among Republicans by an almost three-to-one margin. As in other states, McCain easily won among independents and Democrats but they made up only about 36 percent of the vote.

SHAKES UP RACE

McCain, a one-time prisoner of war in Vietnam, shook up the Republican race on Monday by attacking leaders of the powerful Christian Coalition in its home base of Virginia Beach and portraying Bush as a willing servant of religious extremists.

McCain said Robertson in particular "has no place in my view in the Republican Party and that kind of politics that has been practiced so often by him and Mr. Falwell should be rejected."

Bush, campaigning in Cleveland, derided McCain's claim to be the political heir to former President Ronald Reagan, saying the Republican icon did not have "a spiteful agenda."

"He had an optimistic agenda as do I," Bush said.

But McCain's challenge could provide a rallying cry for all those Republican and centrist voters disturbed by the influence wielded by religious conservatives on the Republican Party.

Polls in Washington last week showed a close race. It was the first West Coast state to take part in the election so far.-Reuters