The House GOP’s campaign organization raised $8.1 million in March for its efforts to keep the speaker’s gavel in Republican hands.

The National Republican Congressional Committee will end the first quarter of the 2014 cycle with the same sum, $8.1 million, in the bank, according to fundraising figures provided exclusively to CQ Roll Call.

This marks the third straight month the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has bested the NRCC in fundraising. The DCCC outraised its GOP counterpart by just more than $5 million — $22.6 million to $17.5 million — in the first quarter of this year.

Republicans cited online fundraising as one of the reasons their cash count lags behind. The DCCC’s online donations program continues to flourish, and committee officials say it has brought in more than triple the sum they raised in the first quarter of the 2012 cycle.

But the House GOP’s member contributions are also to blame for the difference. On Wednesday, House Democrats announced that 19 percent of their first-quarter haul came from their caucus.

An NRCC spokeswoman declined to say how much of the group’s haul came from member donations. However, at a conference meeting this week, the NRCC announced a new push to ask members to pay their dues.

GOP Reps. Todd Rokita of Indiana, Stephen Fincher of Tennessee, Lynn Jenkins of Kansas and Steve Stivers and Jim Jordan of Ohio are leading the effort.

“I am proud of these leaders in our conference for stepping up and working with their colleagues to increase our Member participation as we work to strengthen our Majority in the House and ensure that Nancy Pelosi never sits in the Speaker’s chair again,” NRCC Chairman Greg Walden of Oregon said in a statement.

Stivers, the NRCC finance chairman and a prolific fundraiser in his own right, has been assigned a goal of 100 percent participation for member dues.

Several GOP members have already stepped up to the plate. An NRCC official named the following as examples: John Campbell of California, Diane Black of Tennessee, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida, Ralph M. Hall of Texas, John Kline of Minnesota, Ann Wagner of Missouri, Keith Rothfus of Pennsylvania, Richard Hudson of North Carolina and Roger Williams of Texas.

The NRCC paid down $1.75 million of its debt last month, leaving it $8.25 million in arrears.

The campaign committees must file their monthly fundraising reports by April 20.