Democrats turn sights on New Hampshire after Iowa fiasco

Democratic candidates were anxiously awaiting results from the Iowa caucuses on Tuesday after technical glitches plunged the kickoff vote of the US presidential nominating contest into chaos, drawing the mockery of President Donald Trump.

Pete Buttigieg, the 38-year-old former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, claimed victory although the Iowa Democratic Party had not yet released any official results, and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders also declared that he had done "very, very well."

Former vice president Joe Biden's campaign for its part said that although it had "zero official data" so far it believed it had won its "fair share" of the vote and it was a "tight race with bunched up candidates."

But Joe Rospars, chief strategist for Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, chided the other candidates, tweeting that "any campaign saying they won or putting out incomplete numbers is contributing to the chaos and misinformation."

The Iowa Democratic Party said precinct results were still coming in and blamed the delay on an app that was reporting only partial data.

"While our plan is to release results as soon as possible today, our ultimate goal is to ensure that the integrity and accuracy of the process continues to be upheld," it said in a statement.

"We have every indication that our systems were secure and there was not a cyber security intrusion," it added. Buttigieg, who is battling Biden for the moderate wing of the party, said that based on an internal tally it was a "clear victory for this campaign."

"We were able to demonstrate both the winning message and the winning organization," Buttigieg said in an interview with MSNBC. "This is really the first proof point for how we're building the campaign that is ultimately going to go on to defeat Trump" in November's presidential election, he added.