New finance reports show Clinton campaign lacking funds

This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Monday April 21 2008. It was last updated at 16:39 on April 21 2008.

Hillary Clinton's campaign began the month of April virtually broke, owing more money than it had in the bank, it emerged yesterday.

Federal campaign finance reports show her rival Barack Obama's campaign remains flush with cash even as he outspent Clinton by nearly a third in March

The divergent financial reports, came as relations between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama reached a new low at the weekend with a series of increasingly destructive exchanges and "attack" ads ahead of tomorrow's Pennsylvania primary, the last big contest of the Democratic party's 15-month presidential nomination campaign

The two camps now routinely swap personal criticism to a degree rarely seen when the battle for Pennsylvania began seven weeks ago

Obama, abandoning his stance as a candidate standing above the fray, claimed that Clinton had adopted a "slash and burn" strategy in the knowledge that she was no longer able to win

A retired general and Obama supporter, Walter Stewart, told reporters that, because of Clinton's lie about being under sniper fire during a visit to Bosnia, she would lack the "moral authority" as president to lay a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier.

Howard Wolfson, Clinton's communications chief, described it as the "most outrageous attack of the campaign". The Obama campaign distanced itself from the remark

As the race enters the final hours before polls open in Pennsylvania, the Clinton camp finds itself in perilous financial condition

According to a report filed yesterday with the Federal Election Commission, at the end of March the campaign owed $10.3m but had only $9.3m available to spend on the primary election. The campaign owes $4.6m to Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates, a polling firm of which Clinton strategist Mark Penn is a principal figure.

Penn, a long-time Clinton aide and once a chief strategic hand for her presidential campaign, faced a demotion earlier this month after it emerged that he had met with Colombian officials on a controversial trade agreement, even as Clinton opposes the deal

The campaign reported raising $20.2m, including $720,000 for the general election and spending $22.4 million in March. In the election cycle to date, the Clinton campaign has raised $175.7m, including $22.4m for the general election, and spent $163m

Obama at the end of March had $42m in the bank for the primary election. His campaign in March raised $41m, including $888,000 for the general election, and spent $30.6m. For the 2008 election, he has raised $240.2m, including $9.12m for the general election, and spent $189.1m

The latest opinion poll, published yesterday by the McClatchy newspaper group, put Clinton on 48% to Obama's 43%, with 8% undecided. She needs to win by a margin of 10% or more to head off calls to quit the race

Geoff Garin, the head of the Clinton campaign team, told NBC's Meet the Press yesterday that she intended to stay in the race after Pennsylvania. Resisting pressure from Democratic leaders to end the contest, Garin said: "There is no need to make a rush judgment."

The next contests after Pennsylvania are on May 6 in North Carolina, which Obama is expected to win easily, and Indiana, which polls suggest is too close to call

David Axelrod, Obama's campaign strategist, acknowledged that Clinton had a right to remain in the race, even though her defeat was inevitable. But he denounced her "kitchen-sink" strategy of throwing everything at Obama, which could damage the party's chances in November against the Republicans

Obama, who will have spent $9.3m on television advertising in Pennsylvania, a record for a primary, put out two fresh ads at the weekend, one attacking Clinton's healthcare policy. Bill Clinton, also on the campaign trail, described the ad as "bull", while the Clinton-supporting governor of Pennsylvania, Ed Rendell, said ad spending by Obama was "almost obscene"

The Obama camp also latched on to derogatory and apparently inaccurate remarks by Clinton about MoveOn, an influential group of anti-Iraq war activists.

The Huffington Post website played comments she made at a private fundraising dinner in February at which she said: "MoveOn didn't even want us to go into Afghanistan. That's what we're dealing with. You know they turn out in great numbers ... they flood into these caucuses and dominate them and really intimidate people who show up to support me."

Eli Pariser, MoveOn's executive director of the group, said the group had never opposed the war in Afghanistan

Obama, in a piece of old-style political theatre, took a special train across the state, stopping off along the way to address crowds. At a late-night rally in Harrisburg on Saturday, he told 8,000 people on the steps of the state capitol building that Clinton had taken more money from lobbyists than any Democrat or Republican, whereas he had not taken any. This would mean a continuation of the same old Washington politics if she became president, he said

Clinton, speaking to a crowd in Wynnewood on Saturday, took a dig at his rhetorical style. "I don't want to just show up and give one of those whoop-dee-do speeches and get everybody whipped up. I want everyone thinking," she said.