Obama Raises Over $5 Million Since Polls Closed Super Tuesday; Campaign Using Hillary’s Self Funding To Raise Money

Following reports that Senator Hillary Clinton loaned her campaign $5 million dollars in late January, Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe sent out an fundraising appeal to supporters. At the time of the email, according to the campaign Obama had raised over $3 million since the polls closed on Super Tuesday, at the time of this post that figure was already over $5 million.

Plouffe writes (graphic from email to featured right):

The Clinton campaign just announced that Hillary and Bill Clinton injected $5 million of their personal fortune into her campaign a few days ago.

It’s worth noting that Plouffe does seem to try and instill a bit of hysteria amongst Obama supporters by claiming that the loan could end up being as close to $20 million:

The Clinton infusion of $5 million — and there are reports it could end up being as much as $20 million — will give them huge resources for the next set of primaries and caucuses.

I actually haven’t seen any reports like the one Plouffe mentioned (I have seen reports that she is considering another loan though, but no figures were mentioned) . If anyone has seen such a report, would you kindly email or comment?

Regardless, this fundraising appeal is a wise move for the Obama campaign. They’ll have to be careful though not to paint Clinton too far into a corner, lest she become the underdog. If the pendulum swings too far in his direction and Hillary has a subsequent victory, the momentum could be affected. This is probably why the Obama campaign is consistently saying that Clinton is still the frontrunner (at some point though, especially with numbers like this, his campaign is going to have to own up to the frontrunner label and what it brings with it).

As an aside, these fundraising issues probably help explain Clinton’s recent decision to accept Fox News’ debate and to challenge Obama to a debate a week between now and March 4. To date, the Obama campaign has not accepted any proposed debates; Obama spokesman, Tim Burton, said:

“As of right now, there are no debates on our schedule at all. We’ll figure out our schedule, including any debates, soon.”

Naturally, Kos and others is mad about the prospect of giving Fox News a debate:

Obama should say “no way” to the smear mongers on Fox. It’s incomprehensible that Clinton would seek to legitimize the Republican Party’s chief propaganda arm.

Meh. If Obama says no, it should be for his own strategic reasons. It shouldn’t be because Kos told him, nor should it be out of concern for “legitimizing” Fox News. Legitimizing? Really? If they are a propaganda wing, then going on there and being persuasive can only help undermine Fox.