Clinton lent $5 million to her campaign before Super Tuesday

ARLINGTON, Virginia (CNN) -- Sen. Hillary Clinton dipped into her own finances ahead of this week's Super Tuesday contests, lending her Democratic presidential campaign $5 million in late January, she disclosed Wednesday.

In another development, some senior members of Clinton's campaign staff have agreed to go without pay for a month, CNN has confirmed.

"We had a great month fundraising in January -- broke all records," the New York senator and former first lady told reporters.

"But my opponent was able to raise more money, and we intended to be competitive, and we were, and I think the results last night prove the wisdom of my investment."

Clinton won the biggest Super Tuesday prizes -- New York and California -- along with major Northeastern states New Jersey and Massachusetts and four other primaries in the South and West.

But her rival, Sen. Barack Obama, upset Clinton in Missouri and swept caucuses across the Plains and Rocky Mountain states, as well as taking his home state of Illinois and two Southern states, Alabama and Georgia.

Each of the Democratic contenders has raised more than $100 million to date. Clinton had $38 million in cash on hand at the end of the year, but at least $20 million of that was set aside for the general election, meaning it can't be spent on the primaries.

Clinton particularly appeared to savor her win in Massachusetts, where Obama had the support of the state's top Democrats -- Sen. Edward Kennedy; Sen. John Kerry, the party's 2004 presidential nominee; and Gov. Deval Patrick. Watch candidates tout Super Tuesday results »

Obama had been closing the gap with front-runner Clinton in late polls, but she held on to win by a 15-point margin.

Clinton was in suburban Washington to campaign in next week's primaries in the Chesapeake Bay region -- Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia. With Virginia's governor, Tim Kaine, backing Obama, Clinton used her appearance to portray her rival as the party's "establishment" candidate Wednesday.

"I think, look, it's wonderful to have endorsers and supporters," she said. "But, at the end of the day, this is a decision between two real people. It's our names that are going to be on the ballot, nobody else's, and people are going to have to look at us and decide who they believe would be the best president."

Clinton's lead in Tuesday's big states gave her the edge over Obama in delegates to the Democratic Party's nominating convention, according to CNN estimates.

But because of the party's allocation system and Obama's larger number of victories in smaller states, her lead was fewer than 100 of the 1,500-plus delegates awarded to date.

Results from one contest, the New Mexico primary, remained incomplete and too close to call Wednesday afternoon. E-mail to a friend

CNN's Candy Crowley and Robert Yoon contributed to this report.

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