Santorum: I'll Remain in the Race 'to the Very End'

Two days before the Nevada caucuses, presidential hopeful Rick Santorum said Thursday his campaign strategy for the rest of his White House run will be to show how his positions differ from the Republican front-runners and he will continue to avoid and deride the divisive, negative ads run by his competitors. Santorum also said he plans to be in the race “to the very end.”

 

Fox News’ Sean Hannity,  however, noted that a recent Santorum ad goes after Newt Gingrich, slamming the former speaker by saying “you had your chance and you are not a true conservative.” Santorum countered his ad focuses on issues and not supposed personal foibles.

 

“I think it's different . . . if you look at my ad, it’s on issues,” Santorum said. “I’m factually representing his positions on those issues and they are different than mine. What I objected to in the mud wrestling I talked about is all these personal attacks on Newt working for Freddie and Fannie or Mitt Romney having, you know, having companies that went under.
 

“And, look, you know, people are allowed to go out and make their money and neither of them have been accused of anything unethical in the work that they did in the private sector,” Santorum said. “But to bring that up as if somehow or another, this taints you, and to be so personal and nasty about it . . . I think they crossed the line.”
 

Santorum acknowledged that although negative acts may work with voters, in “the long term for our democracy, the long term for us as a party, it’s a negative thing.”

“They should go after each other hard on the issues — I’m going to go after them hard on the issues,” the former Pennsylvania senator said. “Because that’s what ultimately I believe this election in the fall is going to be about — having the best person who can take on Barack Obama on the issues because, if it’s personal, we are going to lose — because people like Barack Obama.”

Santorum said he believes the momentum will shift his way and that he is the best candidate to beat Obama.

“It’s hard to predict the path to victory . . . so what I would say is that we are going to go out and compete in every state — our intention is to be in this thing to the very end,” he continued. “We have the least amount of personal and professional baggage, we have the right contrast on the issues, we’ve got the right track record from the standpoint of . . . where I come from in Western Pennsylvania to be able to win those key states — I have the right policies to be able to attract those Reagan Democrats that can help us win this election.

“The last few days for our campaign, we raised half a million dollars in two days — people are beginning to realize that Mitt and Newt are not that different, that this mud wrestling they have been involved in is not going to be good for either of them as far as contrasting with Barack Obama.”