Obama beats McCain in Virginia: Fox

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama won the Virginia presidential vote on Tuesday, defeating rival John McCain to break the state's 40-year history of backing Republicans in the race for the White House, Fox News projected.

Obama, an Illinois senator who would be the first black U.S. president, was narrowly leading McCain in opinion polls before the election and the state was widely considered a tossup. He is the first Democrat to carry Virginia since Lyndon Johnson in 1964.

The victory gives Obama Virginia's 13 electoral votes, and the capture of a traditionally Republican state pushes him closer to the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency in the United States' indirect system of choosing a leader.