Huge triumph for McCain

ORLANDO, Fla. — Sen. John McCain won a breakthrough victory in the Florida primary Tuesday, seizing the upper hand in the Republican presidential race ahead of next week's coast-to-coast contests and lining up a quick endorsement from soon-to-be dropout Rudy Giuliani.

"It shows one thing: I'm the conservative leader who can unite the party," McCain said after easing past former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney for his first triumph in a primary open only to Republicans. McCain took 57 delegates in the winner-take-all contest.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York won a largely symbolic Florida Democratic primary. None of the Democrats campaigned in the state and no delegates will be awarded because the state party scheduled the contest earlier than the national party allowed. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois was a distant second, with former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina in third.

Still, the Clinton campaign claimed a big Florida win. "I am thrilled by the vote of confidence you have given me today," Clinton said at a rally in Davie.

The Obama campaign matched the effort to spin the results, mockingly saying it would call the race early and announcing that the candidates were tied for delegates — with each getting zero — when the results were in.

The Republican Party also punished Florida for voting before Feb. 5 without permission, but the GOP cut the number of delegates in half rather than eliminating them.

Giuliani, the former New York mayor, ran third. It was his best showing of the campaign, but not nearly good enough for the one-time front-runner who decided to make his last stand in a state that is home to tens of thousands of transplanted New Yorkers. Officials familiar with events said he intended to endorse McCain today in California.

In Orlando late Tuesday, Giuliani referred to his candidacy repeatedly in the past tense. "We'll stay involved, and together we'll make sure that we'll do everything we can to hand our nation off to the next generation better than it was before," he said.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee ran fourth in the primary but told supporters he would campaign on. Texas Rep. Ron Paul was fifth.

For McCain, the victory proved he can win without independents or Democrats, who backed him in earlier contests but were barred from participating in Florida's Republican primary. The win came in part because of heavy support from Hispanics, and it helped erase doubts that he can't win over members of his own party.

Radio host Rush Limbaugh continued to rail against McCain last week, but key establishment Republicans, including Florida Gov. Charlie Crist and Sen. Mel Martinez, provided critical support with late public endorsements.

McCain tried to keep the focus of the Florida campaign on foreign policy, where he thinks he has the advantage. A former prisoner of war in Vietnam, McCain rebuilt his campaign last year on the strength of his support for the buildup of U.S. troops in Iraq.

Romney tried to cast McCain as unprepared to confront the economic challenges in Florida and the nation as the stock market tumbled and the housing crisis escalated. But the former corporate chief executive's focus on the economy did not move enough voters to his side.

Preliminary network exit polls show the economy as the breakaway issue, with 45 percent of GOP voters and more than half of Democrats calling it the nation's top concern.

The poll showed McCain leading narrowly among voters most concerned about the economy and by a wide margin among those who said Iraq was the top issue. Romney led comfortably among those most concerned about immigration; voters most concerned by terrorism split their votes nearly evenly among Romney, Giuliani and McCain.

McCain did well in those polls among Hispanics, gaining about 51 percent of their vote.

The Republican race immediately shifts westward today, with a debate in Southern California that kicks off a six-day frenzy of cross-country campaigning in advance of Super Tuesday, when 24 states and one territory hold contests.

The debate will offer McCain and Romney their best chance to communicate to a national audience, giving one a platform to build on momentum won in Florida and the other an opportunity to strike back. It also could give Huckabee a final chance to break into the race again. Giuliani has said he plans to participate, too.

Romney appeared to get more blame for a series of nasty exchanges with McCain that laid bare their dislike for one another. In the past three days, Romney has called McCain "dishonest" and a "liberal Democrat," while McCain has accused Romney of "wholesale deception" of voters.

Huckabee trailed well behind after choosing not to campaign much in Florida. Huckabee has signaled an intention to remain in the race for as long as possible, soliciting donations from his supporters by writing in an e-mail that "we don't have to win every state, but we do have to do very well in a number of states to help fuel our momentum heading into the Texas primary on March 4."

The Florida primary became a critical test for the Republican candidates after an early-voting schedule that did little to settle uncertainty about who should claim the mantle of leadership after eight years of President Bush.

Huckabee's victory in the Iowa caucus signaled that religious conservatives had found in the former Baptist minister a candidate to rally behind. But his shoestring effort has fizzled since then as Huckabee has failed to energize a broader constituency.

In New Hampshire, McCain's convincing win revived his campaign and established him as the man to beat. But Romney's victories in Michigan and Nevada slowed McCain's momentum until the senator won again in South Carolina.

So the three candidates headed to Florida, where Giuliani sat waiting for his chance in the political spotlight.

But that chance never really came.

After Giuliani largely skipped the first five contests, his once-sky-high poll numbers in Florida plunged when the others arrived. By primary day, surveys showed him fighting with Huckabee for third place.

Giuliani campaigned hard throughout Florida, touting his leadership, his experience managing New York City and his support for a national insurance fund that would make it easier for Floridians to purchase affordable homeowners and flood insurance.

He also spent more than $4 million on television ads, campaign mailers and a sophisticated ground organization. Thousands of volunteers made hundreds of thousands of get-out-the-vote calls in the final days of the campaign here. On the day before the primary, he flew reporters across the state for a series of rallies.

"We're going to win Florida tomorrow," Giuliani said repeatedly, promising that a victory in the Sunshine State would propel him to the nomination and to the White House.

But Giuliani's campaign was repeatedly upstaged by McCain and Romney, who greeted each other gingerly in a national debate in Boca Raton but let the aggression fly in several days of exchanges that barely disguised the contempt they held for each other.

McCain attempted to shift the conversation to national security by accusing Romney of having supported a date for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

Romney called that "dishonest" and demanded an apology from McCain, who refused and said that Romney owed an apology to the men and women serving in the military in Iraq.

That spat was followed by two days of arguing about which of the two was the more liberal. Romney said McCain's achievements in Congress on immigration, campaign finance and energy would take the country on a "liberal Democratic course." McCain charged that "Mitt Romney's campaign is based on the wholesale deception of voters."

On Tuesday, McCain touted his late endorsement by Crist at a polling station in St. Petersburg, saying "the real issue here in Florida is who can keep them safe."

As for the Democrats, Clinton's victory was expected and may have largely reflected her prominence on the national political scene for almost two decades. She did well among those who cast their votes early; among late deciders, Obama matched her almost one for one, according to exit polls conducted by Edison/Mitofsky.

Clinton flew late Tuesday to Fort Lauderdale from Washington, and in nearby Davie she thanked more than 1,000 supporters in a banquet room for a "tremendous victory." She was also seeking to reach Florida's television audience, which did not see any of the Democratic candidates before the primary because of their pledge not to campaign in the state.

"You know, I could not come here to ask in person for your votes, but I'm here to thank you for your votes today," she said.

By waiting until the polls closed to land in Florida, she said, she was obeying party rules. But some Obama supporters denounced Clinton's act as cynical and urged voters and journalists to dismiss Florida as a meaningless beauty contest.

"The bottom line is that Florida does not offer any delegates," said Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, the 2004 Democratic nominee for president. "It is not a legitimate race."

Material from The Associated Press and The New York Times is included in this report.