On Heels of V.I. Win, Hillary Clinton Takes Puerto Rico, Inching Closer To Nomination

ST. CROIX — Hillary Clinton, on the heels of her convincing win in the U.S. Virgin Islands, beat Bernie Sanders in Puerto Rico on Sunday, bringing the candidate closer to the Democratic nomination, now only 28 delegates away from her reach.

Mrs. Clinton is expected to arrive at the needed 2,383 on Tuesday, when some six states — California, New Jersey, New Mexico, South Dakota, North Dakota and Montana — vote, and she is expected to declare the primary battle over.

But Mr. Sanders has said he will not concede even then, vowing to take the battle to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, and wrest superdelegates from Mrs. Clinton. He plans to make the case that he is a stronger candidate against Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, contending that, among other things, a number of polls have showed him beating Mr. Trump by wider margins than Mrs. Clinton can.

And on Sunday, Mr. Sanders, hinting at the urgency of his campaign as it continues to lose ground, drew a sharp line of attack against Mrs. Clinton, criticizing donations made by foreign governments while she was secretary of state to the Clinton Foundation, the organization founded by former President Bill Clinton.

A convention is seen as contested when a candidate cannot reach the necessary delegate count using both pledged delegates and superdelegates. During her protracted and heated battle in 2008 against President Obama, Mrs. Clinton  suspended her campaign and moved to unite the party shortly after the last primary. Mr. Sanders, however, is promising to tread new ground and take his fight all the way to the convention.

Even so, after Tuesday, Mrs. Clinton is expected to become the first ever female nominee for a major political party in the United States. During a “State of the Union” interview on CNN, Mrs. Clinton promised to do all in her power to unite the party by reaching out to Mr. Sanders following tomorrow’s results.

“After Tuesday, I’m going to do everything I can to reach out, to try to unify the Democratic Party, and I expect Sen. Sanders to do the same,” she said. “And we will come together and be prepared to go to the convention in a unified way, to make our case, to leave the convention, to go into the general election to defeat Donald Trump.”

Correction: June 7, 2016

A previous version of this article, because of a text error, listed five states as voting on June 7, when the actual number is 6. The story has been updated to reflect the correct information.