Obama's presidential campaign for the White House started in early June 2008 when he defeated Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic primaries. Hillary Clinton was favored to win but Obama won many smaller state caucuses (local party elections) by having a lot of volunteers. He decided not to accept government money for his campaign so that he could accept more private money under Campaign finance reform in the United States. He raised the most amount of money ever for a presidential campaign. 