OXFORD’S Democrats have been toasting their candidate’s victory in the US Presidential elections.

Barack Obama won re-election to the White House yesterday with slightly more than 50 per cent of the vote.

Artist Ted Dewan, originally from Boston but now lives in Beechcroft Road, Summertown, is an Obama supporter.

He said: “I missed Ohio being bagged but I got to see the speeches. The problem with staying up all night is that you’re not sure if you’re dreaming or not.

“I feel a great sense of relief because of Romney’s policies. I think this is the right administration and I hope they can accomplish what they set out to achieve.

“It all goes on way too long. I love the fact that UK elections only last five or six weeks.”

Oxford has a strong track record of supporting the Democrats.

It is one of only four areas of the UK with its own chapter of Democrats Abroad – the others being Cambridge, Scotland and Yorkshire – and is one of the few places in the UK where the party’s supporters can vote in person in the primary elections.

In 2008, Oxford backed Obama by 118 votes to Hillary Clinton’s 26, while earlier this year 14 out of 18 votes cast in the city backed Obama.

Student Eva Lam, of the Oxford branch of Democrats Abroad, stayed up to celebrate the result at Rhodes House in South Parks Road.

She said: “Frankly, I am quite relieved. In 2008 I was still at university in the USA and I was surrounded by thousands of Obama supporters but there were quite a few of us who stayed out until the bitter end this time.

“I can tell from the volume of emails I have been getting that they have been really pushing for voters back home but it’s part of the democratic process.”

Ms Lam, who is originally from Wisconsin, now lives in East Oxford.

Mr Obama had a lead in the polls over his Republican adversary Mitt Romney for most of the campaign and on the day before the election he had a three per cent lead.

He had also been the bookies favourite to win the election.

Americans living abroad voted in the Presidential election by absentee ballot sent electronically.

Nigel Bowles, director of Oxford University’s Rothermere American Institute, said: “It seems that it will not have been a very close election at all.

“But American elections are not popularity contests and there is no single popular vote. It is done through the electoral college and the states will have been won by small amounts.”