Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney pressed his case for spurring energy and economic gains in delegate-rich states that vote in next week’s Super Tuesday contests as Rick Santorum tried to exploit doubts about his opponent.
Romney, seeking momentum after twin primary wins, assailed President Barack Obama’s energy policies and offered himself as the only Republican candidate with the business experience to create jobs. Santorum, his leading rival, raised questions about Romney’s core beliefs and commitment to socially conservative principles.
Both men were aiming for victories in the 11 contests to be held March 6, which together award the largest delegate haul in the campaign so far and could go a long way to determining the nominee in an unpredictable Republican race.
Romney, 64, a former Massachusetts governor, implored voters in North Dakota and Idaho, which hold caucuses that day, to participate in the contests.
“I don’t need a lot; I just need you to go out and vote,” Romney said in a high school gymnasium packed with about 1,000 people in Idaho Falls. “I want to make sure we win, we win solidly in Idaho, that I get the delegates I need to go on and win the nomination.”
Santorum, seeking to rebound from losses in the Arizona and Michigan Feb. 28 primaries, appealed to voters in Georgia -- the state that awards the most delegates next week -- to “stand with the conservative” in the race.
Pivot to Economy
Two thousand miles to the northwest in Idaho Falls, Romney said he is “running against some good guys in the primary, but you know, they don’t have any experience in business.”
“To get America on track, to create good jobs, it helps to have a president who’s had a good job, and I have,” he said.
Romney made the pitch as he sought to pivot from a flap yesterday over his stance on contraception coverage, renewing his criticism of Obama’s economic record and blaming the president for slowing U.S. energy development.
Obama “has tried to slow the growth of oil and gas production in this country, and coal production,” Romney said during an appearance in Fargo, North Dakota. “Far from taking credit, he should be hanging his head and taking a little bit of the blame for what’s going on today.”
Lease Rates
He said Obama has halved lease rates and slashed drilling permits by a third, and is now trying to get the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate hydraulic fracturing.
“He’s got 10 federal agencies trying to push their way into fracking so that they can slow down the development of oil and gas,” Romney told a few hundred people seated on a warehouse floor at Wrigley Mechanical, a mechanical contracting firm in Fargo.
Romney’s promise to expand energy development came in a state whose oil boom has fueled an 8.7 percent growth in economic health during Obama’s presidency, according to the Bloomberg Economic Evaluation of States index that measures such statistics as tax collections, personal income, home prices and employment.
The Obama administration has emphasized data that show domestic crude oil production at the highest level in eight years. At the same time, U.S. warnings to Iran about its nuclear program helped drive gasoline futures to a nine-month high.
‘Licking Their Chops’
The U.S. public spreads the blame for higher gasoline prices, citing Obama, oil companies and unrest in the Middle East, according to a poll by the Pew Research Center in Washington.
Eighteen percent fault the Obama administration, 14 percent say oil companies are to blame and 11 percent cite the situation with Iran and in the Middle East, Pew said. The poll was conducted Feb. 23-26 among 1,005 adults. The error margin is plus or minus 4 percentage points.
Discussing energy policy for the third time in a week, Obama said in a speech in Nashua, New Hampshire, that his Republican critics are “licking their chops” at the prospect of rising gasoline prices as higher energy costs threaten to crimp the economic recovery.
Romney also presented himself in Fargo as a defender of social conservatives’ priorities, telling a voter who asked him about gun laws that he would “protect the right to bear arms.”
He used the question as a chance to reiterate his support for a Senate measure that would allow employers to deny health- insurance coverage for contraception and other services that violate their principles. The legislation, proposed by Senator Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican who backs Romney, was defeated today on a 51-48 vote in the Democratic-controlled chamber.
‘Violates’ Conscience
Romney created confusion yesterday about his stance on the legislation, telling an Ohio television interviewer he didn’t support it, only to have his campaign quickly issue a statement saying he did back the bill and had misunderstood the question.
The Obama administration health-care rule the measure sought to undo “violates the conscience of the church, the conscience of individuals and fortunately there’s an effort in Washington to stop that, to reverse that,” Romney said today.
The dust-up over contraceptives reflected doubts many Republican rank-and-file voters have about Romney’s stance on social issues.
Santorum, 53, the former Pennsylvania senator who has emphasized his opposition to abortion rights, seized on the episode today, saying it gave voters insight into “what’s in the gut of Governor Romney.”
‘Gut Reaction’
“If I was asked a question like that, my gut reaction” would always be “you stand for the First Amendment. You stand for freedom of religion,” he told voters gathered in an airport hangar in Atlanta. “You want someone who at their core believes and is going to step up and fight, not put them on the back burner.”
Polls taken before Romney’s wins this week showed Santorum ahead in Ohio, a Super Tuesday state that’s often a bellwether in the general election.
“We feel very comfortable that we’re going to do well in a lot of states on Super Tuesday,” Santorum said.
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