Iowa: Cruz, Trump and Rubio top GOP winners

by NW Spotlight

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz was the Republican winner in last night’s Iowa caucuses, winning 27.65% of the vote and 8 delegates. Donald Trump took second with 24.31% of the vote, and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio took third with 23.09% of the vote. Trump and Rubio tied for second in delegate count – both gaining 7 delegates. Ben Carson came in fourth with 9.31% of the vote and 3 delegates.

That makes 3 of the top 4 Republican winners in Iowa ethnic minority candidates – Sen. Ted Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio are Hispanic, and Dr. Ben Carson is African-American – something that likely won’t get much attention from a very biased media because it doesn’t fit a narrative they espouse.

The Democratic presidential candidates are notably lacking ethnic diversity – as was noted by Spanish-language news anchor Jorge Ramos last October.

Republican delegate winners in the 2016 Iowa caucuses:

Marco Rubio is the only Oregon Catalyst top 3 pick from last July to actually make the top 3 in Iowa.

On the Democratic side – it is an incredibly close race. With 99.94% of the precincts reporting, Hillary Clinton holds a slight lead with 49.86% and Bernie Sanders has 49.57%. The Iowa Democratic Party chairman said “the results were the closest in Iowa democratic caucus history.” Martin O’Malley trailed considerably with only 0.57%.

Democrat Martin O’Malley and Republican Mike Huckabee both announced they were dropping out of the race after last night’s results.

The next state in the 2016 presidential primary/caucus schedule is New Hampshire – a week from today. Then it’s on to South Carolina and Nevada later this month.

NOTE: Iowa uses caucuses to select their presidential nominees – New Hampshire uses a primary election (Sources: Today, FactCheck)