Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama are heading for a meeting of the money.
As the ex-foes are scheduled to sit down face to face this week and talk fund-raising, each needs to leave the table with the promise of riches.
New campaign-finance filings reveal Clinton has even more debt than previously reported, while Obama’s fund-raising has stalled.
He pulled in $22 million in May – a sharp drop from the $30 million to $55 million he got in each of the prior three months.
And presumptive Republican nominee John McCain came up almost even with his Democratic rival, taking in $21 million last month.
The new reports show Clinton’s debt has risen to $22.5 million – $12 million of which is in personal loans she poured into her campaign – and she reported only $3 million in available cash. More debt is expected to be reported in the coming weeks.
In a conference last week, Clinton urged her top fund-raisers to support Obama but also asked that she at least get enough money to pay back her vendors – an estimated $10 million.
The New York senator said she was willing to take a total loss on her personal loans.
“I’m not expecting anybody to help pay that back,” Clinton told fund-raisers, according to a transcript posted by the Web site Talking Points Memo. “But I am hoping to get your help in our efforts to pay off our vendors . . . any amount you can give or help raise would go a long way.”
Obama’s May haul lacked the big-bucks bang many had come to expect from the candidate – and he and Clinton are expected to discuss how to help each other financially at a Washington meeting Thursday.
Clinton asked 100 of her biggest donors to attend.
The unlikely duo will then campaign together Friday, but an Obama spokesman said there’s no specific plan to rescue Clinton from her debt.
Discussions so far “have focused more on what these two can do to bring the party together and move it forward than it has on these logistical details,” Obama communications director Robert Gibbs said last week.
But Clinton’s backers aren’t shy about their feelings that the former first lady deserves some help.
“It’s far more productive for Obama to have Hillary 100 percent focused and engaged on campaigning and raising money for him in the fall rather than having to do fund-raisers at the same time to retire her debt,” said Hassan Nemazee, a Clinton national finance chairman.
In a show of unity, several top Clinton foreign-policy advisers last week joined Obama’s team, including former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, a staunch supporter of the New York senator.
Powerful Clinton fund-raisers like John Emerson of Capital Guardian Trust, Thomas Steyer of Farallon Capital Management and Gary Gensler, who was Treasury undersecretary under President Clinton, have also been merged into the Obama team.
Obama, who last week broke his pledge to use the general election’s public-finance system, ended May with $43 million in hand and $304,000 in debt.
Only $10 million can be spent in the fall after the party conventions, leaving Obama with $33 million to carry him through the summer months.
McCain, who will accept public financing, will have $84 million to spend in the general election.
Additional reporting by James Fanelli
gotis@nypost.com