Mitt Romney takes all in Tuesday primaries, declares race with President Obama

Mitt Romney, the possible Republican presidential nominee, swept the five Republican primaries on Tuesday. The former Massachusetts governor was expected to win in New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Rhode Island. With a staggering lead in the delegate count and his nearest competitor, Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, out of the race, Romney told a cheering crowd in New Hampshire, “A better America starts tonight.” Speaking on the job of President Barack Obama, Romney said, “The last few years have been the best that Barack Obama can do, but it’s not the best America can do. Tonight is the beginning of the end of the disappointments of the Obama years, and it’s the start of a new and better chapter that we will write together.”

Democrats continue to reiterate that Republicans want to take America back to the same policies that caused the recession of 2008. Speaking with CNN’s “Piers Morgan Tonight” after Romney’s speech on Tuesday evening, Obama 2012 press secretary Ben LaBolt said, “The fact is a better title for Gov. Romney’s speech tonight, [rather] than ‘A Better America,’ should have been ‘Back to the Future,’ because he’s proposing the same economic policies that got us into the economic crisis in the first place.” Romney became the presumptive nominee on April 10, after his closest rival, Santorum, suspended his campaign for personal reasons. Although former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and U.S. Representative Ron Paul of Texas continue their long-shot bids for the White House, the Republican Party appears to consolidate around Romney. Romney now has 695 of the 1,144 delegates needed to secure the nomination. Santorum holds 273, Gingrich 141, and Paul 72. Romney could reach the nomination as early as late May, while President Obama has already clinched the Democratic nomination, according to CNN.