Obama, Clinton Pledge a United Front for Campaign

By Kristin Jensen

June 27 (Bloomberg) -- Hillary Clinton said she will devote herself to the election of Barack Obama, her former rival for the Democratic nomination, and asked her supporters to join them in the battle to win the White House.

``We may have started on separate paths, but today our paths have merged,'' Clinton told more than 4,000 people gathered at an outdoor rally in Unity, New Hampshire. ``Today we are coming together for the same goal -- to elect Barack Obama as the next president of the United States.''

The event in the town of 1,700, the first joint campaign appearance by the two candidates since the primaries ended, marked a closing of Democratic ranks behind Obama for the general election campaign against Arizona Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee. Unity has symbolism beyond its name: in the January New Hampshire primary Obama and Clinton each drew 107 votes there.

``This was a hard-fought primary campaign,'' Clinton said before Obama took the microphone. ``Today and every day going forward we stand shoulder to shoulder.''

Obama, Clinton Pledge a United Front for Campaign....

Obama Secures Democratic Nomination

By Kristin Jensen and Kim Chipman

Barack Obama has won enough delegates to clinch the Democratic nomination for president based on projections from the South Dakota primary and pledges of party superdelegates, CNN, Fox News and MSNBC reported.

While Clinton was projected to win in South Dakota, according to Fox, Obama gained a big enough portion of the state's 15 pledged delegates to reach the threshold for the nomination, helped by a flurry of endorsements today from party leaders.

He is poised to become the first black candidate to lead a major U.S. party into the November general election.

In a speech he's scheduled to give tonight in Minnesota, Obama will declare himself the presumptive nominee and praise Clinton as an inspiration to millions of Americans.

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