With Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama locked in a draw for votes, the battle is on for funds as the longest, most expensive White House race on record drains millions already raised.
With four states set to vote this weekend (Louisiana, Kansas, Nebraska and Maine) and another three contests this Tuesday (Maryland, Virginia and DC), the two candidates have been asking supporters to dig deep since their Super Tuesday clash failed to anoint a Democratic front-runner.
Now that veteran Arizona Senator John McCain is all but guaranteed the Republican nomination after rival Mitt Romney quit on Thursday, the pressure is on the Democrats to unite behind a candidate to fight the November elections.
Both Mrs Clinton and Mr Obama have sought to seize the advantage by portraying themselves as ahead in the money-raising battle seeking to consolidate their positions after the Super Tuesday stalemate.
Mr Obama announced on Thursday he had raked in a further $7m (€4.8m) since Tuesday's presidential primaries, as the former first lady said her campaign had raised $7.5m (€5.2m) since 1 February.
But Mrs Clinton’s aides reportedly acknowledged that a 'temporary cash-flow problem' left the campaign unable to match Mr Obama’s advertising in some of the upcoming states, which could play kingmaker in the tight race.
In a sign of Mrs Clinton's cash crunch, the New York senator was forced to lend $5m (€3.4m) of her own money to the campaign this week as she also looks to the 4 March primaries in delegate-rich Texas and Ohio.
With the Clinton and Obama campaigns both chasing the magic number of 2,025 delegates needed to secure the nomination at the party’s August convention, every remaining primary now counts.
More than 400 delegates are up for grabs in the seven upcoming votes and the candidates have been hitting the campaign trail hard and blitzing voters with advertising.
The 2008 White House race is already the costliest ever.
