Despite Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s two big wins in Nevada and Florida recently, his rival Rick Santorum is confident in his campaign going forward and predicts he will “do very well in Minnesota.”
Minnesota is one of three different states with Republican primary voting occurring Tuesday, four if you count the ongoing Maine Republican caucuses where voting ends Saturday. In an appearance on Fox News after finishing last place in Nevada, Mr. Santorum stated that his rivals will no longer have the “natural advantage” going forward that they each had in the first five primary voting states.
Mr. Romney held the regional advantage in New Hampshire, while former House Speaker Newt Gingrich enjoyed a regional advantage in South Carolina. Each of those two candidates won those states, and despite Mr. Santorum being declared the winner of Iowa, Mr. Romney still held an advantage there in terms of spending on television advertisements.
However, the former Pennsylvania Senator believes that going forward the candidates will have to rely more on their campaign message than their financial or regional advantages.
“Now, we’re getting to the states where people don’t have the natural advantage, don’t have the time commitment, the staff commitment to really build out an organization like they did in these first five,” said Mr. Santorum, appearing on “Fox News Sunday.”
Mr. Santorum’s campaign has suffered from a lack of funding throughout the early stages of the Republican primary race. In Iowa, he spent no money on television advertisements, relying instead on an aggressive on the ground campaign where he visited all 99 counties in Iowa prior to any of the other candidates doing the same.
The former senator saw a boost in fundraising though after initially finishing in second place in Iowa and then being declared the winner of Iowa prior to the South Carolina primary election.
Now, as the candidates move towards the upcoming states with primary elections and caucuses, Mr. Santorum is again relying on making more on the ground campaign appearances than his rival candidates. He also seems to be granting as many national television appearances as possible so that voters in the upcoming states can hear his message.
The latest Public Polling Policy poll of voters in Minnesota shows Mr. Santorum leading the race there leading up to Tuesday’s Minnesota Republican caucuses. The PPP poll released Sunday shows Mr. Santorum leading Mr. Romney by two percentage points. The former Pennsylvania Senator is scheduled to make four campaign stops in Minnesota on Monday, and will likely greet voters in Minnesota as they head to their voting precincts Tuesday.
There are a total of 40 delegate votes up for grabs in Minnesota, the most delegate votes available out of Tuesday’s elections. If Mr. Santorum can get a win there he still may not receive all of those delegates, but it would help him to greatly cut into Mr. Romney’s current advantage, as he currently leads Mr. Santorum by more than 70 delegate votes.
“I think we’re going to do very well here in Minnesota. I think we’re going to do very well in Colorado, and we’ve got a one-on-one match up against Mitt Romney in Missouri, while there’s no delegates, it is a key state, it is a primary. And we think we can do exceptionally well in the state of Missouri,” said Mr. Santorum.
