Rick Santorum, 53, is a former senator from Pennsylvania who was once the chamber’s third-ranking Republican. As a lawmaker, he was critical of homosexuality -- which he once compared to bestiality -- as well as abortion and stem-cell research. In 2005, Time magazine named him one of the nation’s 25 most influential evangelicals. Santorum withdrew from the race on April 10, 2012.
Santorum’s willingness to take uncompromising stands on social issues made him a target of Democrats who easily defeated him in 2006. Democrat Bob Casey won the election by 18 percentage points.
Since then, Santorum has worked at a law firm, as a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer and, until this year, as a commentator for Fox News.
Santorum was born in Winchester, Virginia and grew up in Pennsylvania, the son of a clinical psychologist who worked for the Veterans Administration. He received his undergraduate and law degrees from Pennsylvania State University, where he was head of the college Republicans. He also earned a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Pittsburgh.
He worked for a law firm for four years until winning his first House race in 1990 at the age of 32. He was elected to the Senate in 1994 and served two terms. Santorum and his wife Karen have seven children. An eighth died shortly after birth.
Rick Santorum News
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Former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania will announce today that he is suspending his bid for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, a person close to the campaign said.
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Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign pulled an attack ad set to air in Pennsylvania targeting Rick Santorum, responding to the Republican rival’s decision to suspend politicking after the hospitalization of his daughter.
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The leading rivals for the Republican presidential nomination campaigned in the final hours before Wisconsin’s primary with different goals: Mitt Romney focused on President Barack Obama and November’s general election while Rick Santorum tried to stay viable.
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On the eve of Wisconsin’s Republican presidential primary, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum campaigned in the state with two different missions: Romney worked to pivot to President Barack Obama and the November general election, while Santorum fought to keep his candidacy viable.
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Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum won Louisiana’s primary, giving him another victory in a region where Mitt Romney, the front-runner for the nomination, has struggled.
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Illinois delivered primary wins for Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush that effectively clinched their Republican presidential nominations. Mitt Romney’s victory in the state yesterday may not yield the same clarity.
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Campaigning in Illinois ahead of what polls show could be a close primary vote, Romney toughened his critiques of Santorum, even as he keeps a focus on President Barack Obama, whom Republicans are trying to unseat in November.
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Rick Santorum took in $9 million in February, bringing his campaign fundraising to $15.7 million, Federal Election Commission records show. He had $2.6 million in the bank at the end of the month.
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Mitt Romney said he expects to become the Republican presidential nominee as rival Rick Santorum called him a weak candidate to run against Democratic President Barack Obama in the November election.
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While the messages of Romney and Santorum may win votes in the Republican presidential primaries, they’re likely to face a chillier reception during the general election in battleground states such as Nevada and Colorado, where the Hispanic population has surged.
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With minimal campaign organization and less funds than his rivals, Santorum has boosted his campaign with the votes of a network of evangelical Christians, anti-abortion rights activists and home-schooling parents who are resisting frontrunner Mitt Romney.
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In Illinois, long a domain for mainstream Republican politicians, Mitt Romney counts on strong support for his party’s presidential nomination.
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Rick Santorum won the Alabama and Mississippi Republican presidential primaries, strengthening his status as Mitt Romney’s main challenger and dealing a setback to Newt Gingrich.
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Rick Santorum’s wins in Mississippi and Alabama may have done more damage to Newt Gingrich than to front-runner Mitt Romney.
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Mitt Romney’s Republican presidential rivals are boosting attacks ahead of Southern primaries this week that could start to winnow the field.
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The Republican presidential candidates snacked on hickory-smoked ribs, used grits as a campaign prop and joked about shooting rifles with a comedian famous for “redneck” humor as they made a final push for victories in two Deep South primaries.
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Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, pressing for a victory in tomorrow’s Illinois primary, is branding both President Barack Obama and primary rival Rick Santorum as economic lightweights.
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For all the concern expressed by Republicans about the growth of the national debt under President Barack Obama, his 2013 budget envisions less borrowing than plans from his top rivals, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum.
Opinion from Bloomberg View
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In a famous speech 52 years ago, presidential candidate John F. Kennedy said he believed that “the separation of church and state is absolute,” and promised that as a Roman Catholic, he would not take orders from the pope.
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“The one who can beat Obama: Rick Santorum,” the television commercial proclaims. That boast brings cheers from two quarters: the faithful followers of the conservative Republican presidential candidate, and the Democratic president’s political strategists.
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Like Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum is more admired than liked. Many of Santorum's former Senate colleagues don't love him, though some respect him.
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Christian conservative leaders passed up the opportunity to rally behind Rick Santorum in Iowa. Their support may have given him the votes he needed to defeat Romney.
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For the moment, the former Pennsylvania senator has emerged as the candidate of the evangelicals just in time for a frontloaded primaries schedule heading fast into South Carolina.
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Santorum’s virtual tie with Mitt Romney in Iowa makes him just about all that stands between Romney and the Republican nomination. It's time to read up more on the former Pennsylvania senator's policies.
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Because money follows momentum, Santorum now has a good shot at mounting a stiff challenge to a stiff front-runner who has shown little ability to appeal to three-quarters of today’s GOP.
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At the Iowa caucuses, it seemed voters were seeking the least objectionable among a group of undesirables, however, to a non-Iowa non-Republican, it looked as if Iowa Republicans had an embarrassment of riches.
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The much-maligned Iowa phase of the campaign has been extraordinarily useful at clarifying the ideas, weaknesses and strengths of the Republican field.
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The NBC-Marist poll provides further confirmation of what everyone in Iowa is talking about -- former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum’s timely surge that may put him in the top tier of the Jan. 3 caucuses.
Presidential Campaign News
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Updated 44 minutes ago
Tesla Motors Inc., the electric-car maker run by Elon Musk, plans to sell as much as $830 million in shares and debt to be first to repay its federal loan awarded under a program that fueled political controversy.
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Updated 2 hours, 4 minutes ago
From the moment Barack Obama spoke at the Democratic National Convention in Boston in 2004, he has enjoyed a reputation as a politician with a claim to the high ground.
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Updated 43 minutes ago
President Barack Obama’s failure to appoint inspectors general to five cabinet-level agencies, including the Pentagon, is putting taxpayer money at risk, oversight groups said.
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Updated 1 hour, 43 minutes ago
The White House released almost 100 pages of e-mail debate between President Obama’s staff, the CIA and the State Department that formed the basis for the administration’s public statements in the days that followed the attack on a U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya.
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Updated 1 hour, 18 minutes ago
U.S. Commerce Secretary nominee Penny Pritzker received $54 million last year from an offshore trust in the Bahamas, according to a disclosure report that describes an empire of casinos, hotels, energy companies and family trusts that may be worth more than $2 billion.
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Updated 43 minutes ago
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo wants to break the connection between cash and politics that’s led to corruption in Albany for decades, and he says public financing of election campaigns is the solution.
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Updated 32 minutes ago
When Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan is ushered into the Oval Office today, he’ll press President Barack Obama to do more to help topple Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Erdogan is likely to leave disappointed.
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U.S. lawmakers introduced legislation that would authorize President Barack Obama to provide arms to the Syrian opposition, even as support for the rebels weakened at the United Nations.
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Updated 3 hours, 3 minutes ago
The widening inquiries into the Internal Revenue Service are focusing less on why employees singled out small-government groups for scrutiny and more on agency executives who didn’t inform Congress earlier.
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It’s time to let television viewers buy individual channels rather than being required to pay for bundles of programming, and to end blackouts of sports events in publicly financed stadiums, U.S. Senator John McCain said.
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