Sanders is projected to defeat Hillary Clinton by massive margins in his home state, and his speech to supporters was accordingly jubilant. “We want to win in every part of the country, that goes without saying, but it means so much to me that the people who know me best ... have voted so strongly to put us in the White House,” Sanders said.
As happy as the hometown crowd was, humming along to warmup act Ben Folds, it seems unlikely that the rest of the night will go as well for Sanders. When he took the stage he’d already lost in Georgia and Virginia; Clinton has now bagged Alabama and Tennessee, and is likely to win Texas and Arkansas as well.
But his speech made clear that his focus extends well beyond tonight. “At the end of tonight 15 states will have voted,” Sanders said. “Thirty-five states remain, and
let me assure you that we are going to take our fight for economic justice, for
social justice, for environmental sanity, and for a world of peace to every one of
those states.”