Obama Bucks

In the run-up to Super Tuesday, Hillary Clinton may have scored a symbolic win this week in Florida but Democratic rival Barack Obama countered with something far more tangible—a whopping $32 million raised in January alone.

The Obama campaign announced its impressive haul today and said the cash came, in part, from 170,000 new donors. Campaign manager David Plouffe said that the windfall will allow the Illinois senator to advertise at a fairly high level in just about all of the 22 states at play next Tuesday.

The $32 million matches the Obama camp's best three-month fundraising period in 2007, when the campaign raised $30 million in primary money and $2 million for the general election (money that can't be touched until, and if, he's chosen by his party as the Democratic nominee). The money raised in January was all for the primaries.

A spokesman for the Center for Responsive Politics told Portfolio.com that neither Obama nor any other 2008 White House hopeful has raised that much money in such a small time frame, but could not readily confirm if that number broke any general election records.

"We think that the strength of our financial position and the number of donors does speak to financial sustainability if it ends up going through March and April," Plouffe said of the race. "We think we will have the financial resources to conduct vigorous campaigns in the states to come."

Obama and Clinton both raised about $100 million each in 2007. Clinton's team reported raising more than $24 million in primary funds during the last three months of 2007, while Obama's campaign reported raising $22 million in primary funds during the period.

It's unknown how well Clinton's campaign did in January, and Clinton officials weren't offering up details today. ''Once people start voting that's a more important measure of performance,'' Clinton spokesman Jay Carson told the Associated Press.

Money is "one of the most important markers in the period before actual voters start voting. We're no longer in the invisible primary, we're in the real primary," he said.

"There's an unprecedented bidding war going on between Hillary and Obama—the likes of which I've never seen," said Kenneth Gross, a campaign finance lawyer who advises Democratic candidates and is a former general counsel of the Federal Election Commission. He said Obama's take was "extraordinary."

If a clear nominee does not emerge after Super Tuesday or the following weeks, Gross said, Obama's cash will allow him to spend more money on TV coverage and rely less on outside groups who may be supporting him for exposure. "Obviously this gives him sustainability through February."

Fourth quarter 2007 figures for all the candidates will be released by the Federal Election Commission at midnight tonight.

by Liza Porteus Viana