Santorum was in Green Bay this afternoon rallying supporters before the crucial Wisconsin primary on April 3. I'm not a Santorum fan by any stretch, but I had missed him in Iowa and he was speaking barely thirty minutes from my parents' home in Appleton so I decided to make an attempt to meet my fifth candidate this cycle.
The event was held at The Ravine, a restaurant and banquet hall technically in Bellevue, Wisconsin even though Santorum repeatedly referred to the location as Green Bay. I got there over an hour before the scheduled 6:00 p.m. start time and am glad I did because the police announced they were locking the doors for security reasons at 5:30 p.m. even though the ballroom wasn't close to capacity.
There weren't many surrogates or local public officials in attendance. The only ones I was aware of were former State Representatives and one-time rival congressional candidates John Gard and Terri McCormick, State Senator Glenn Grothman, and current State Representative Andres Jacque. Jacque gave a nice introduction which included a bit about how he remembered watching then-Congressman Santorum on CSPAN (his idea of good TV) after he'd put his siblings to bed while babysitting.
Santorum had previously been in Milwaukee and Sheboygan today but still had a full head of steam. He started off his remarks by acknowledging that he was a diehard Pittsburgh Steelers fan and had actually been at the 2011 Super Bowl between the Green Bay Packers and Pittsburgh Steelers and remembered watching in agony as his Steelers went down in defeat. Even so, he was looking forward to visiting the "shrine" of Lambeau Field later that evening and had great respect for the Packers organization. Santorum said he was a little disappointed that no one in the crowd was wearing a cheesehead.
Santorum's speech was a paean to fiscal and social conservatism and a harsh critique of Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee. Midway through, Santorum introduced his fourteen year old daughter, Sarah Marie, who brought him an Etch A Sketch that he proceeded to use as a prop to slam Romney for the rest of the speech.
Santorum's most lengthy criticism of Romney was in regards to the issue of Puerto Rican statehood. Santorum explained that one of the bedrock principles of the Republican Party of Puerto Rico is its support for statehood. He knew this, and when he was asked if he supported statehood for Puerto Rico prior to that territory's primary he said yes. When asked if there would be conditions he also said yes. Santorum believes English should be the official language of the country and claimed only 15% of Puerto Ricans speak it. He was "hammared" for this answer.
Governor Romney, on the other hand, told the Puerto Rican Republican primary voters what they wanted to hear. Romney has, according to Santorum, the exact same position he does on opposing bilingual education and making English the official language of the United States. But when asked if Puerto Rico should become a state, Romney said yes without any conditions. "People wonder," Santorum continued, "Gee, why did Governor Romney do so well in Puerto Rico." To answer his own question he held the Etch A Sketch upside down and shook it.
If the event had been a town hall, I would have asked Santorum if he would campaign for Mitt Romney once Romney was the nominee. He's said he'll vote for the Republican, but the rhetoric he used against Romney at the rally today suggested to me the answer to whether or not he'd campaign for Romney might very well be no.
After speaking, Santorum ventured into the crowd giving me an opportunity to meet him and snap a picture. His daughter followed behind Santorum and his Secret Service detail and once the candidate had passed I asked her if life on the campaign trial was fun. She said it was but that it was also very tiring. It may be for her and the rest of Santorum's family but I got the sense that Santorum is genuinely enjoying himself on the trail. I'm becoming increasingly worried, however, that the overly harsh rhetoric he's using against the eventual nominee will come back to hurt Romney in the general election against President Obama.
