Obama raises $19 million in 2008 money chase

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Sen. Barack Obama raised $19 million in the last three months in his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, adding 93,000 new donors and bringing his total haul to $75 million, his campaign said on Monday.

Obama's fundraising for the primary campaign was down from $31 million in the second quarter, when he led all Democratic candidates. Fundraising typically drops in the third quarter as candidates compete for attention with summer vacations.

Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, who holds a strong lead on the 2008 Democratic field in national polls but trailed the Illinois senator in fundraising last quarter, has not reported her figures yet.

John Edwards, the 2004 Democratic vice presidential nominee who is running third in national polls, raised $7 million in the third quarter, aides said, down from his $9 million second-quarter total.

Obama's campaign said the fundraising haul, and a donor list that now exceeds 350,000, showed grass-roots strength and cast doubt on predictions Clinton was too strong to beat.

"This grass-roots movement for change will not be deterred by Washington conventional wisdom because in many ways it is built to challenge it," said Obama's campaign manager, David Plouffe.

Candidates for president must report their fund-raising activity every three months. The third quarter ended at midnight on Sunday, and detailed financial reports must be submitted to the Federal Election Commission by October 15.

Those reports will offer detailed breakdowns on the spending and savings rates of each campaign and how much cash they will have left for the final three-month push to the first votes in Iowa in early January.

Donors can give up to $2,300 to finance the primary race and another $2,300 for the campaign for the November 2008 general election if the candidate gets the nomination. Obama raised another $1 million for the general election in the third quarter, his campaign said.

While Clinton leads in national polls, she is in a three-way struggle in the early voting state of Iowa with Obama and Edwards, who said last week he will accept public matching funds and their accompanying spending limits and challenged Clinton and Obama to do the same.

Edwards has about $12 million in cash heading into the final quarter, and will be eligible for at least $10 million in public funds, aides said. More than 150,000 donors have given to Edwards' campaign, and 93 percent of the donations were for $100 or less, they said.

"We're very pleased with where we are," Edwards' deputy campaign manager Jonathan Prince told reporters. "We've got more than enough money to execute our strategy."

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson reported raising about $5.2 million in the third quarter, down slightly from $7 million in the second quarter. Richardson has raised about $18.5 million in the first nine months of the year.

Richardson's camp said the amount put him in a position to challenge for the nomination and separated him from other contenders like Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden and Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd.

"This figure obviously separates us from the second-tier candidates and makes clear this is a four-person race," said Richardson spokesman Tom Reynolds.

None of the Republican candidates had released their fundraising figures yet.

(To read more about the U.S. political campaign, visit Reuters "Tales from the Trail: 2008" online here)