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ByJuliePaceand Jonathan Lemire TheAssociatedPress NEW YORK Front-runners Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton swept to victory with ease in Tuesday's New York primary, with Trump bouncing back from a dif- ficult stretch in the Repub- lican contest and Clinton pushing closer to locking up the Democratic nomi- nation. Trump's victory was a psychological boost for his campaign, though the impact on his path to the GOP nomination was still to be determined by the number of delegates he se- cured. If he captured more than 50 percent of the vote, he would be in strong po- sition to win most of New York's 95 delegates, an im- pressive haul. With the votes still being counted, Trump declared that it was "impossible" for his rivals to catch him. "We don't have much of a race anymore," he said during a victory rally in the lobby of the Manhattan tower bearing his name. His peppered his confi- dent remarks with more references to the economy and other policy proposals than normal, reflecting the influence of a new team of advisers seeking to profes- sionalize his campaign. Clinton's triumph pad- ded her delegate lead over rival Bernie Sanders, de- priving him of a crucial opportunity to narrow the margin. Sanders vowed to compete through all of the voting contests, though his odds of overtaking Clinton at this stage in the race are low. "We've got a shot to vic- tory," Sanders said in an in- terview with The Associ- ated Press. "We have come a very long way in the last 11 months, and we are go- ing to fight this out until the end of the process." Sanders spent Tues- day in Pennsylvania, as did Trump's main rival Ted Cruz. The Texas sen- ator panned Trump's win as little more than "a pol- itician winning his home state," then implored Re- publicans to unite around his candidacy. "We must unite the Re- publican Party because doing so is the first step in uniting all Americans," Cruz said in remarks read off a teleprompter. The fight for New York's delegate haul consumed the presidential contenders for two weeks, an eternity in the fast-moving White House race. Candidates blanketed every corner of New York, bidding for votes from Manhattan and the surrounding boroughs to the working class cities and rural enclaves that dot the rest of the state. Trump needed a strong showing to keep alive his chances of clinching the GOP nomination before the party's July convention — and to quiet critics who say the long primary season has exposed big deficien- cies in his campaign effort. Having spent months re- lying on a slim staff, Trump has started hiring more seasoned campaign veter- ans. He acknowledges that bringing new people into his orbit may cause some strife, but says the moves were necessary at this stage of the race. Cruz is trying to stay close enough in the dele- gate count to push the GOP race to a contested conven- tion. Cruz's campaign feels confident that it's mastered the complicated process of lining up individual dele- gates who could shift their support to the Texas sen- ator after a first round of convention balloting. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, the only other Republican left in the race, was seek- ing to add to his scant del- egate total and keep up his bid to play a long-shot spoiler at the convention. Kasich has refused to end his campaign despite win- ning only his home state. Tr ump's political strength, though he boasts of drawing new members to the party, has left some Republicans concerned that his nomination could splinter the GOP. Among Republican voters in New York, nearly 6 in 10 said the nominating contest is dividing the party, accord- ing to exit polls. Trump leads the GOP race with 756 delegates, ahead of Cruz with 559 and Kasich with 144. Securing the GOP nomination re- quires 1,237. Among Democrats, Clin- ton has 1,758 delegates to Sanders' 1,076. Those to- tals include both pledged delegates from primaries and caucuses and super- delegates, the party insiders who can back the candidate of their choice regardless of how their state votes. It takes 2,383 to win the Dem- ocratic nomination. PRESIDENTIAL RACE Trump, Clinton triumph on home turf in New York primaries JULIEJACOBSON—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump arrives to speak during a New York primary night campaign event, Tuesday in New York. PABLO MARTINEZ MONSIVAIS — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton points to members in the audience a er speaking at the 2016Legislative Conference of North America's Building Trades Unions in Washington, on Tuesday. "W e d o n' t h av e mu ch o f a r ac e an ym or e. " — D on al d T ru mp WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20, 2016 REDBLUFFDAILYNEWS.COM | NEWS | 5 B