PORTLAND, Ore. -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's big Oregon victory was announced just moments after the deadline for ballot drop-offs Tuesday.

The nominee's victory was nearly immediately declared at 8 p.m., just moments after the deadline for ballot drop-offs closed.

With 65 percent of the expected vote counted, Obama beat Republican Sen. John McCain by 55 percent to 43 percent, taking rural as well as urban parts of the state.

The John McCain campaign virtually conceded the race for the presidency at about 7:30 p.m. Election Night when they announced that after losing Pennsylvania and Ohio they didn't see a way for his campaign to achieve the 270 Electoral College votes necessary for victory. No Republican has ever won the presidency without winning Ohio.

Riding a wave of newly registered Democrats and enthusiasm for his message of change, Barack Obama took Oregon's seven electoral votes Tuesday.

In the days leading up to the election, Obama's victory in Oregon seemed to be all but a foregone conclusion after a Portland Tribune-FOX 12 poll placed him 19 points ahead.

According to the poll, 34 percent of voters were siding with McCain, a 6-point drop between September and the end of October. Obama pulled in 53 percent of people polled, a 3-point increase from a month prior. Eight percent of voters remained undecided at the time the poll was conducted.

That large gap in polling contributed to the decision by both candidates not to schedule any campaign stops in Oregon.

However, Obama did make a campaign stop in Portland during the Democratic Primaries in May to estimated crowds of more than 75,000 at Tom McCall Waterfront Park. The crowds were the largest that he had seen up to that point and hinted that the Democrat had a large base of support in Oregon.

Obama visited Oregon several times during the toughly fought primary and earned big crowds in urban and rural settings who were enthusiastic for his message of change in Washington, building a green economy, bringing troops home from Iraq and fixing a broken health care system.

Though Obama never came back to Oregon, his extensive campaign organization registered a record number of Democrats, giving the party its biggest advantage ever over Republicans.

A phone poll of voters the week before Election Day suggested voters were swayed primarily by the belief Obama was the man to fix a broken economy.

But on Election Night, Obama voters said their feelings went far beyond the economy.

Voters Voice Their Support For Obama

Russ Germick, 37, a business manager for a wind power company, said he voted for Obama in hopes he would restore the United States' status in the world.

Sitting next to him in a downtown bar watching vote returns, Theodora Lenihan, 31, a Portland attorney, said she originally backed Hillary Clinton out of a belief she could overcome bitter partisanship in Washington. But after Obama won the nomination, she found she agreed with his domestic agenda.

"I am of mixed racial origin," as Obama is, she added. "You are part of something, but not part of anything. Obama understands that. It gives him perspective."

Shawn Mayer, 29, a Portland physician, said even before falling stock prices and rising home mortgage foreclosures signaled an economic crisis, "I felt Obama had a much better idea of dealing with this level of responsibility than any Republican has had for a long time."

His wife, Meghan Mayer, 26, an administrative assistant, said Obama had an "intellectual depth to him," and could examine issues from "more than one point of view."

Kristin Spear, 39, a Portland wardrobe stylist, said she had originally supported Sen. Hillary Clinton, but the more she heard Obama, the more she agreed with him.

"I think he's smart," she said. "Starting tomorrow, worldwide confidence is up. I have tears in my eyes tonight. One reason is I have black friends. This means somebody besides a white male can run this country and it gives hope to the whole world."

Jessica Ryff, 25, a Portland physician, said Obama's greatest accomplishment was to engage a whole new segment of the population in the election.

Andrea Lynch, 53, a Beaverton elementary school teacher, registered voters and canvassed households.

"It's unbelievable," she said at Democratic campaign headquarters, where people went wild when Obama's victory was announced on big-screen TVs. "A lot of us were a little afraid it wasn't going to happen because of the last couple of elections in 2000 and 2004. This is so decisive, that so many swing states went for Obama means it's a good clean election. He can go in and get stuff done."