Santorum’s Path To and From Iowa

Johnston, Iowa

For most of the 2012 campaign, Rick Santorum struggled to be heard. He groused about his share of time in the debates, was hard to find on television chat shows and couldn’t afford advertising. But his surprising near-tie with Mitt Romney in the Iowa caucuses has given Santorum one of the loudest voices in politics—and a chance to block Mitt Romney’s path to the Republican nomination.



The question now is whether the former Pennsylvania Senator can survive beyond Iowa. Santorum, 52, staked everything on the Hawkeye contest. In days that began before dawn and ended after dark, he drove a borrowed Dodge pickup across all 99 Iowa counties and held nearly 400 events. “He was willing to drive a long way to go talk to one or two or three people,” says campaign manager Michael Biundo. He also pursued a proven Iowa strategy of targeting socially-conservative voters, who cheered his intense opposition to abortion and gay marriage. While he chafed as one rival after another surged past him in the polls, his allies preached patience. “I always told him, Iowa breaks late and it breaks fast,” says Bob Vander Plaats, an influential social conservative leader whose mid-December endorsement helped to propel Santorum–just as Newt Gingrich collapsed under a bombardment of attack ads. “It was a perfect storm.”      More