Obama takes in more than $19M for primaries

? Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama raised more than $19 million during the past three months for the presidential primaries, demonstrating strong continued donor support even as he trails rival Hillary Clinton in national opinion polls.

Like Democratic candidates John Edwards and Bill Richardson, who respectively reported raising at least $7 million and about $5.2 million during the period, the pace of Obama’s fundraising slowed slightly over the summer, when many donors and volunteer fundraisers took vacations.

But the fundraising performance keeps Obama on track to raise a staggering $100 million this year for the primary campaign, a funding level that Clinton also could well reach.

Clinton, by late Monday, had not disclosed her fundraising total for the July-to-September quarter, which ended at midnight Sunday. But her campaign previously has come close to matching Obama’s fundraising.

Her aides last week telegraphed a likely quarterly total of about $20 million, including money raised for the general election.