Clinton will stay in race until June

NEW YORK — Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton vowed to remain in the presidential race until the last primaries next month, but she hinted that the protracted contest with rival Barack Obama would end shortly thereafter.

"You don't walk off the court before the buzzer sounds," Clinton said on CNN. "You never know, you might get a three-point shot at the end."

The former first lady spoke to the major news networks in Washington as her campaign looked to parlay her lopsided victory in West Virginia into a last-ditch effort to persuade superdelegates to give her flagging candidacy another look.

Badly trailing Obama in fundraising and cash on hand, Clinton was hosting some 50 of her top national fundraisers at her home Wednesday to seek their help in raising money to compete in the final five contests in Kentucky, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Montana and South Dakota.

She faces a more than $20 million debt. Clinton owed $10 million at the end of March, has made loans to her campaign totaling of $11.4 million thus far and will more than likely end the primary season significantly in the red.

On a conference call with reporters, campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said the campaign had pulled in a seven-figure fundraising haul online Tuesday night but declined to offer more specific numbers.

"We have the resources to go forward," McAuliffe said. "We've opened offices, we're up on TV, we have a full complement of staff and are raising money. I'm comfortable with where we are today."

On CNN, Clinton said that she shouldn't have suggested in a newspaper interview that Barack Obama was having trouble winning over "hardworking ... white Americans."

Told that a top black supporter, Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., had called the remark "the dumbest thing you could have possibly said," Clinton said "Well, he's probably right."

Obama is running to become the first black president.

On ABC News, Clinton said some voters may be discriminating against Obama because he is black but that there are probably an equal number voting against her because she's a woman.

"There are people ... who have reluctance about a woman, have reluctance about an African American. But thankfully, those are a relatively small minority," she said. "And I'm not sure that those people would ever vote for one of us."

Recent comments