As a happy crowd chanted “Kenny, Kenny,” Hulshof took the podium at 10:50 p.m. to declare victory in the hard-fought GOP primary for governor.

Saying he had just talked to Sarah Steelman. Hulshof congratulated her for being a “courageous public servant” and “tenacious campaigner.”

Hulshof then began listing some of the themes he will stress in the general election battle with Democrat Jay Nixon. Hulshof began with his strongest defense so far of the 2005 cuts that lopped 100,000 adults from the state’s Medicaid rolls.

Hulshof said Nixon, who wants to reinstate the coverage, would return Missouri to “a broken and bankrupt Medicaid system. He’s perfectly willing to rob our classrooms” to pay for health care for the poor.

“You and I are going to tell him, that’s the wrong way, Jay,” Hulshof said.