Hillary Clinton declared a historic victory for women as she grasped the Democratic Party nomination and the chance to become America's first female president.
"Thanks to you, we've reached a milestone," a beaming Clinton told ecstatic supporters in New York: "the first time in our nation's history that a woman will be a major party's nominee."
The former first lady took a dramatic step toward the White House by winning New Jersey, New Mexico and South Dakota, three of six states voting on the last major date of the 2016 primary calendar.
The biggest prize of all, California, was still up for grabs, but with polls closed there and 40 percent of precincts reporting, Clinton held a substantial lead.
The victories effectively put an end to her battle with challenger Bernie Sanders, the self-declared democratic socialist senator from Vermont who waged an extraordinarily successful grassroots campaign.
But Sanders, ignoring the political writing on the wall, vowed to "continue the fight."
"Our mission is more than just defeating Donald Trump, it is transforming our country," he declared to supporters in Santa Monica, California.
Clinton's triumph came almost eight years to the day since her first Oval Office bid was spectacularly thwarted by a charismatic young senator named Barack Obama.
Two terms later, the 68-year-old declared another glass ceiling broken, setting up a colossal showdown in November with Trump, the bombastic Republican flagbearer.
"We believe that we are stronger together and the stakes in this election are high, and the choice is clear," she said, before launching into a frontal attack on her Republican rival.
"Donald Trump is temperamentally unfit to be president and commander in chief," she said, using rhetoric that would have been unthinkable before this tempestuous election season.
Clinton had held a commanding lead over Sanders even before Tuesday's (June 7) votes, having passed the magic number of 2,383 delegates required to clinch the nomination.
"I want to congratulate Senator Sanders for an extraordinary campaign," Clinton said, touching on the watchwords of her rival — inequality and upward mobility.
Trump, who himself crossed the Republican threshold Tuesday although it was a foregone conclusion, signaled Tuesday (June 7) he plans to go on the offensive against Hillary and Bill Clinton.
"The Clintons have turned the politics of personal enrichment into an art form for themselves," he told supporters at his golf property in New York state.
Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has a strong advantage over presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump among Asian-American voters, the fastest-growing multicultural segment in the US, according to a new poll.
The survey, published by Asian Americans Advancing Justice, found that Clinton and President Barack Obama are both more highly rated among Asian-American voters than they are among the general public. Trump, however, was less seen favorably among Asian Americans than among the general public.
A report published by Nielsen said the Asian-American population has grown by 46% between 2002 and 2014. It also said that this population now represents 6% of the total US population. The report also said China and India have replaced Mexico as the largest sources of recent immigrants to the US.
