The Latest on the 2016 presidential race, with attention focused on the Democratic primary in South Carolina on Saturday (all times local):
7:10 pm from National Public Radio
Hillary Clinton is the projected winner in South Carolina Democratic primary, capturing a state she suffered a devastating loss in just eight years ago.
The Associated Press called the race for the former secretary of state over rival Bernie Sanders just seconds after the polls closed at 7 p.m. EST.
A Clinton victory in the first southern primary had long been expected, and even the Vermont senator's campaign seemed resigned to a loss as voting began. Clinton will be in Columbia to deliver a victory speech this evening, while Sanders opted instead to turn his eye toward Super Tuesday states on March 1st and is campaigning in Minnesota.
Sanders congratulated Clinton in a statement, but cast an eye toward the bigger contest in just three days.
"Let me be clear on one thing tonight. This campaign is just beginning. We won a decisive victory in New Hampshire. She won a decisive victory in South Carolina. Now it's on to Super Tuesday," the Vermont senator said. "In just three days, Democrats in 11 states will pick 10 times more pledged delegates on one day than were selected in the four early states so far in this campaign. Our grassroots political revolution is growing state by state, and we won't stop now."
Still, the Palmetto State victory is an important one for Clinton. It's the first contest where a majority of the electorate has been made up of minority voters. According to early exit polls, a record share of Democratic voters were African-American, an increase from even the previous benchmark eight years ago.
Younger voters however, a key part of the Sanders base, were a much smaller share of the electorate than in previous contests this year. In Iowa and New Hampshire, voters under 30 made up just under 20 percent of the primary vote.
A decisive victory in South Carolina gives Clinton a heavy lift of momentum heaving into Tuesday's important slate of primary contests, where more voters in more than a dozen states will go to the polls as more with 865 delegates up for grabs.
Many of the states voting, especially in the South, have more diverse electorates like South Carolina, portending trouble for Sanders in trying to expand his base, which has been much younger and whiter.
"I think that winning in South Carolina is a big deal for her just because of what happened in 2008, but I also think that for Bernie, not doing well here, letting her win by 20 or 30 points, just proves his roadblock, which is diverse voting populations," Amanda Loveday, a former executive director of the South Carolina Democratic Party and a onetime spokesman for Assistant Minority Leader James Clyburn, D-S.C., told NPR earlier.
5:30 p.m. from The Associated Press
Marco Rubio has released summaries of his last five years of tax filings, revealing him to be a candidate with a senator's steady annual income of $176,000 who reaped repeated windfalls from book deals.
During his first four years in the Senate, Rubio and his wife Jeanette together earned an average of $531,000 a year.
Since winning election to an office in Washington, Rubio's income has ranged from $276,059 to $938,963, and he has paid between $46,500 and $254,894 in federal income tax.
Most of the income came from a business that collected royalties on two books, which was disclosed on Rubio's personal Senate financial disclosures.
In 2012, his most lucrative year, his effective tax rate topped out at a little more than 31 percent.
4 p.m.
Bernie Sanders says he is ready to take on Donald Trump.
Speaking Saturday to about 10,000 people at a Formula One racetrack near Austin, Texas, the Vermont senator says he can defeat Trump soundly if he and Trump are the presidential candidates in the fall.
The Democratic presidential contender says Trump is wrong on issues such as the minimum wage, climate change and tax policy.
And Sanders says Americans don't want a president who insults pretty much everyone who's not like him.
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3:15 p.m.
It's been a rough few days for the body parts of the Republican presidential candidates.
Since the explosive debate Thursday night, Marco Rubio has had bad things to say about Donald Trump's face, skin and bladder.
Trump has gone after Rubio's ears.
Ted Cruz has largely limited himself to the usual target, Trump's head of hair, fessing up to the urge on stage to reach over and ruffle it. But Cruz has also questioned Trump's mouth, for swearing so much.
Rubio said Trump used makeup to cover a "sweat mustache" in the debate. And he said Trump used a mirror backstage "maybe to make sure his pants weren't wet."
Trump said it looked like Rubio put on makeup with a trowel, perhaps to cover his ears.
On Saturday, Rubio went after Trump's tan and said he should "sue whoever did that to his face."
They've also been questioning each other's positions on issues.
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1:55 p.m.
Chris Christie is quickly becoming one of Donald Trump's most effective supporters, dishing up attack lines against Trump's rivals with glee.
The New Jersey governor joined Trump at a rally in northwestern Arkansas on Saturday, a day after offering his surprise endorsement.
The pair arrived aboard Trump's jet and dramatically descended the plane together as soaring music played.
Christie repeatedly criticized Trump's top target, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, calling him a no-show senator for skipping votes and committee hearings.
Christie says that being president isn't a no-show job, so Rubio's "not qualified."
Christie also talked up Trump's life story, saying the billionaire businessman had turned his father's real estate holdings in Queens, New York, into a fortune.
He says Trump "wants to bring the American dream back to every American family."
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1:50 p.m.
Hillary Clinton is contrasting her foreign policy experience with that of Republican front-runner Donald Trump.
Speaking at a university gym in Birmingham, Alabama, on Saturday afternoon, Clinton warns voters that the U.S. president becomes the leader of the free world.
She says, "When you run for president it's not just Americans who pay attention. The entire world listens to every word you say. Markets rise and fall, conflicts go forward or retreat."
She adds: "You do have to be careful about what you say and how you say it."
While Clinton never mentioned Trump by name, the comments were clearly aimed at the billionaire businessman. Clinton says he "spends half his time insulting" much of the world.
Clinton is campaigning in the southern state before the March 1 primary.
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2:35 p.m.
Can't these guys just get along?
There's Marco Rubio hitting below the belt — well, actually, above, too — when he says Donald Trump has "the worst spray tan in America."
Trump says Rubio has "a fresh mouth" and is a "light, little nothing."
The animosity seems real and raw as the Republican presidential candidates campaign in some of the states that will be voting Tuesday.
And Ted Cruz simply says, "If we nominate Donald, we'd end up election Hillary as president."
Hillary Clinton is the Democratic front-runner.
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2:10 p.m.
Hillary Clinton has greeted supporters at a restaurant in Birmingham, Alabama, called at Yo' Mama's.
The Democratic presidential candidate is turning her focus to Alabama and other Super Tuesday states on a day when South Carolina Democrats hold their party primary.
Her campaign is banking on Southern states to rack up delegates and expand her lead against Bernie Sanders in the race for the nomination.
The restaurant pays employees above the federal minimum wage of $7.25 and is supporting an attempt by the city's mayor to raise the rate — an effort Clinton endorsed.
She's proposed raising the minimum wage nationwide to $12.
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2 p.m.
Lauren Marsh says it's been some time since she's voted for a Democrat.
But she did just that Saturday in Columbia, South Carolina, going with Bernie Sanders in the Democratic presidential primary.
Why?
The debates made the difference for the 27-year-old independent who's voted for Republicans before but skipped Tuesday's GOP primary.
She says the mudslinging Republican debate Thursday was like "the Jerry Springer show" while the Democrats, as she put it, have been "mentally concise" in their debates.
Overall, Marsh bemoans the divisiveness in politics, even in her neighborhood. She says Americans don't seem united about anything and that's "pretty depressing."
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1:20 p.m.
Former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is endorsing Ohio Gov. John Kasich's presidential campaign.
Gonzales is now the dean of Belmont University's law school. He introduced Kasich at a rally in Nashville on Saturday as "not someone who's apologetic about the United States."
Gonzales was White House counsel to President George W. Bush before becoming the nation's first Hispanic attorney general in 2005. He resigned amid an uproar over allegations of torture of terrorism suspects and controversy over politically motivated firings of U.S. attorneys.
Gonzales acknowledged that Kasich needs to make up ground in the campaign, but says the governor leads the race in "faith and freedom."
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12:35 p.m.
The bickering Republicans presidential candidates are trying to figure out how to cash in on the largest single-day haul of delegates in the race.
At stake on Super Tuesday are 595 delegates in 11 states.
Ted Cruz tells supporters in Atlanta to help him play the numbers game as he takes on front-runner Donald Trump and rival Marco Rubio.
The Texas senator wants backers "to vote for me 10 times," but he's isn't suggesting voter fraud — "we're not Democrats," he jokes.
He's appealing for each supporter to get nine others to vote for him Tuesday.
Cruz calls Super Tuesday "the most important day in this entire election cycle" and says turnout is key.
He says if Republicans nominate Trump, 'we'd end up electing" Democrat Hillary Clinton as president.
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12:15 p.m.
Aspiring first lady Jane Sanders says the Bernie Sanders campaign is looking to Super Tuesday when "I think we'll split the vote."
Expecting a loss in the South Carolina primary, the Vermont senator flew to Texas on Saturday morning and was heading to Minnesota later in the day. Jane Sanders, Bernie Sanders' wife and one of his top campaign advisers, says that South Carolina voting has already started and the campaign has to focus on March 1, when 12 states will cast ballots.
Jane Sanders says they were hoping for a "good showing" in South Carolina. She adds that it has been hard for people to get to know Bernie Sanders there, noting: "the media didn't cover him from May to December. There was nothing in the national media. So of course the South didn't know him."
Still, Jane Sanders says the campaign is feeling good.
"We always knew where we would do well and where we would not do so well," she said. "It's a 50-state election, and we're feeling very confident, actually."
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11:25 a.m.
South Carolina voter Robert Bennett Terry says Democrat Hillary Clinton can beat Republican Donald Trump in the presidential election — but Democrat Bernie Sanders can't.
So who got Terry's vote in the state's Democratic primary on Saturday?
Sanders.
The special education teacher from Mount Pleasant says he wanted to send "a strong message" that many people "are hurting."
He says Sanders is someone "who will bring change to all the people who need change in this great nation of ours."
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11:05 a.m.
"She'll say anything to get votes."
That's what a University of South Carolina professor says about Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on primary day in the state.
Birgitta Johnson says candidate Bernie Sanders' stances on education appealed to her. She says Sanders "deals with structural issues rather than talking points" on education and other issues.
Johnson thinks Clinton is saying the same things as she did when she campaigned against Barack Obama in 2008 — and lost the primary.
Johnson — who voted at a recreational center in suburban Columbia — is concerned about her students and the cost of higher education. She says some of her students have had to quit because they're trying to go to school while working one or more jobs.
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10:45 a.m.
Hillary Clinton hopes a second chance in South Carolina will mean a first.
In 2008, she lost by a wide margin to Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential primary.
On Saturday, Clinton is banking on a first-place finish to give her even more momentum heading into the Super Tuesday contests next week.
Eight years ago, former President Bill Clinton was viewed by some as questioning the legitimacy of the black presidential contender — Obama.
Today, South Carolina voters appear ready to forgive.
Bill Clinton has been well-received in the state and Hillary Clinton has won the endorsement of James Clyburn, the influential black congressman who stayed neutral in the 2008 primary.
According to exit polls, black voters made up 55 percent of the electorate in the 2008 primary.
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8:20 a.m.
It may be election Saturday in South Carolina, but the Democratic candidates for president already have Tuesday on their mind.
That's when 11 states and American Samoa hold nominating contests in the 2016 race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.
Clinton is stopping in Alabama on Saturday before heading to Columbia, the South Carolina capital, for an election party. Polls are closing at 7 p.m.
Sanders isn't even scheduled to put in any South Carolina appearances on Saturday. He's supposed to be in Texas and Minnesota, two of the Super Tuesday states.
He knows his prospects with South Carolina's heavily black Democratic electorate aren't great.
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8:05 a.m.
Voting is underway in South Carolina's Democratic presidential primary, and Hillary Clinton is looking for a big victory — and to win big over rival Bernie Sanders.
Polls opened at 7 a.m. and will close 12 hours later, at 7 p.m.
The candidates won't have much time for a breather after their party's first-in-the-South contest. Next up: Super Tuesday. That's when Democrats will vote in 11 states and American Samoa, with hundreds of delegates up for grabs.
