Huckabee, Obama win in Alabama

updated 10:35 p.m. ET Feb. 5, 2008

MONTGOMERY, Ala. - Mike Huckabee turned out evangelical voters and Barack Obama captured black and young voters as both won Alabama's presidential primaries Tuesday.

Exit polls from the Republican primary showed Huckabee, with strong appeal to fellow Southern Baptists, defeating Arizona Sen. John McCain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who ran third.

Paul Reynolds, co-chairman of Huckabee's Alabama campaign, said Huckabee made two trips to Alabama in the closing stretch — more than any other candidate — and that helped show Alabama Republicans that they had much in common with the former governor of Arkansas.

Across Alabama, about half of the Democratic voters were black, and Obama, the Illinois senator, won 80 percent of their votes. Exit polling also showed he captured 60 percent of the votes from people under 30, who made up more than one in 10 voters.

His opponent, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, did not visit Alabama during the closing days of the primary.

More than 58,000 new voters signed up in the three months leading up to Super Tuesday, prompting election officials to prepare for a better-than-average turnout. Temperatures across the state were spring-like in the 70s and low 80s.

Tobias Wilson, a 20-year-old football player at predominantly black Miles College in Birmingham, cast his first presidential vote for Obama. "He gives a lot of African-Americans hope," said Wilson.

Nina Patel, a 39-year-old housewife from Montgomery, went for Clinton. "I think America should be ready for a woman leader," said Patel, who's of Indian ancestry.

On the Republican side, many voters who chose Huckabee said they were influenced by his background as a Baptist minister and because they viewed him as the most conservative candidate.

"My main issue was where they stand on the Lord and conservative versus liberal. I'm conservative," said Jeff McFarland, a 42-year-old Southern Baptist from Montgomery.

Picking the president: The candidates Click to visit that candidate's MSNBC page or click the XML symbol for an RSS feed. John McCain                Barack Obama

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