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politics and politicians Title: Romney Fights Against Santorum Threat as Minnesota Vote Looms Mitt Romney sought to fend off an added challenge in the Republican presidential race, opening a coordinated assault against Rick Santorum to combat the potential for a drawn-out nomination contest. Amid signs that Santorum could make a strong showing in tonight’s Minnesota caucuses, Romney’s campaign turned its attention from Newt Gingrich, long seen as its toughest rival, and set its sights on the former Pennsylvania senator who won Iowa’s party caucuses. In an interview on a local Minnesota radio station, Romney accused Santorum of increasing government spending by allocating federal funds for local projects known as earmarks. “His approach was not effective,” Romney told WCCO radio yesterday. “If we’re going to change Washington, we can’t just keep on sending the same people there in different chairs.” Santorum struck back, saying Romney’s support for a health- care plan when he was governor of Massachusetts makes him an unacceptable standard bearer for the party. “Governor Romney on that vitally important issue of Obamacare is the weakest candidate we can put up,” he told reporters in Golden, Colorado. “The issue will be about Mitt Romney’s credibility, not about Barack Obama’s record.” Contests in Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota today will award none of the 1,144 delegates needed to win the party’s 2012 presidential nomination. Instead, delegates will be selected at district conventions in all three states, scheduled for April. Bracing for possible defeats, Romney’s campaign circulated a “reality check” memo from his political director emphasizing that no delegates will be picked today. “We expect our opponents to notch a few wins,” Rich Beeson wrote in the memo. The Feb. 28 races in Arizona and Michigan, where Romney grew up, are in states where he’s strong, Beeson said. “It is difficult to see what Governor Romney’s opponents can do to change the dynamics of the race in February.” Still, a victory today would provide a boost for Santorum, who has seen his support drop since defeating Romney by 34 votes in the lead-off Iowa caucuses on Jan. 3. While Romney won the contests since then in New Hampshire, Florida and Nevada, strong support for Santorum could revive questions about Romney’s backing among fiscal conservatives and evangelical voters concerned about such social issues as abortion and gay marriage. Santorum, a Catholic with an anti-abortion record, wants to capitalize on those concerns in Minnesota, where the power of social and fiscal conservatives has grown within the Republican Party. He has spent the bulk of his time over the past week in the state, while Romney, Gingrich and U.S. Representative Ron Paul of Texas campaigned in Florida and Nevada. Campaigning in Colorado yesterday, Romney attempted to blunt Santorum’s efforts by injecting a fresh appeal to social conservatives into his standard stump speech. Speaking before thousands gathered in a high school gym in Centennial, Romney seized on a decision by the Obama administration requiring hospitals to purchase health insurance that covers contraception, a position at odds with the doctrine of many Catholic hospitals and universities. “This is a violation of conscience,” Romney said. “We must have a president who is willing to protect America’s first right, our right to worship God.” Earlier in the day, his campaign circulated a petition posted on its website accusing the Obama administration of attacking religious liberty. In an opinion piece in the Washington Examiner, Romney vowed to immediately overturn the “liberty- and conscience- stifling regulation” if elected. White House spokesman Jay Carney defended the regulation, telling reporters the administration will “implement this policy in a way that ensures that women have access to preventive care, but tries to allay the concerns of these institutions because we take very seriously people’s religious beliefs and their objections.” Romney carried Minnesota in the 2008 presidential primaries, yet aides say this year’s dynamics are different. Four years ago, Romney ran as the fiscal and social conservative alterative to Arizona Senator John McCain, who won his party’s nomination. Today, he’s viewed as the establishment pick, after gaining endorsements from party leaders and elected officials. Supporters played down expectations in the state yesterday, where historically low voter turnout makes results hard to predict. Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, who quit his own bid for the party’s presidential nomination, wouldn’t forecast a Romney victory in the state, saying voters “gravitate toward the most conservative candidate -- real or perceived.” The campaign canceled a stop near Minneapolis yesterday, denying it was ceding ground to Santorum by citing travel conflicts. As Romney addressed voters across Colorado, his team deployed Pawlenty to challenge Santorum’s credentials among fiscal conservatives. “Rick has been holding himself out as the perfect conservative or the only real conservative in the race,” Pawlenty said. “Well, if you look at his record, it’s not a perfect conservative record by a long shot.” Gingrich, making his first appearance since losing the Feb. 4 Nevada caucuses to Romney by 19 percentage points, associated his efforts to slow Romney’s march to the nomination with those of rivals Santorum and Paul. “The three of us will get as many delegates as he does,” Gingrich told reporters in Golden, Colorado. “Between us, we’re in the process of stopping the front-runner.” Appearing last night at the Ramada Mall of America hotel in Bloomington, Minnesota, Gingrich said Romney’s proposals for the country are “timid” and not all that different from Obama’s. “The truth is very hard for the Republican establishment to understand,” Gingrich, a former U.S. House speaker, said. “You cannot stop the decay without very serious political conflict in Washington.” In the audience, Minneapolis caucus-goer Tim Anderson, 50, said he’s backing Gingrich. “I’m scared of Romney,” Anderson said. “I think he’s a RINO, a Republican in name only.”
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