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MESA, ARIZ. — Surging Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum was forced Wednesday to defend his spending record in Congress against a barrage of criticism from rivals in the 20th and last debate before the four remaining candidates face voters in 13 states over the next two weeks.
The debate marked the former Pennsylvania senator’s first foray at center stage, as he has skyrocketed to the top of recent national polls less than a week before primaries in Arizona and Michigan that very well could sway the direction of this fluid GOP race into Super Tuesday and beyond.
Santorum, who has been largely sidelined in most of the previous debates, was hammered particularly hard by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who is fending off Santorum’s surge after having weathered similar challenges to his front-runner status by other conservatives.
“While I was fighting to save the Olympics, you were fighting to save the Bridge to Nowhere,” Romney told Santorum, criticizing the former senator for his history of supporting pork barrel spending measures known as earmarks.
Texas Rep. Ron Paul joined in the attacks on Santorum, calling him a “fake” for claiming to be fiscally conservative even as he secured federal funds for projects back in Pennsylvania.
“The idea of being fiscally conservative now that we’re running for office… it loses credibility,” Paul said.
Santorum was largely unfazed by the attacks, though he drew boos several times from a noticeably pro-Romney audience at the CNN debate when he tried to explain away past votes and positions, including his support for raising the nation’s debt ceiling and his endorsement of former Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, who fell out of favor with the party’s conservatives.
Santorum said he now regrets one vote: His support for President George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind education reforms, which Santorum now says only expanded government intrusion into schools.
“When you are part of the team, sometimes you take one for the team,” Santorum said.
Such exchanges underscored the new political reality for Santorum, who could throw Romney off track with a victory in either Arizona or Michigan Tuesday – but only if Santorum can survive the intensifying scrutiny he’s getting for controversial statements and positions he’s taken.
Santorum’s game plan on Wednesday was twofold: Convince skeptical voters that his social views were not outside the mainstream and draw a clear contrast with Romney, whose health care plan as governor of Massachusetts remains unpopular with GOP voters.
Santorum has received heightened media focus in recent days over his opposition to contraception and fears about “evil forces” setting their sights on the U.S. government. But he stood by the positions in the debate with the aid of his rivals, who turned questions about the contraception debate away from Santorum and onto President Obama.
“What we’re seeing is a problem in our culture with children being raised by children and by parents out of wedlock,” Santorum said, defending his previous warnings about the dangers of contraception. “The bottom line is we have a problem in this country and the family is fracturing.”
Santorum, in turn, lit into Romney over the health care reforms Romney helped establish in Massachusetts and which are held out as a model for Obama’s health care reforms, which Republicans want to repeal.
“You used federal dollars to fund the federal government takeover of health care in Massachusetts,” Santorum charged.
Santorum and Romney dominated the night, as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich — who used previous debates to resurrect his floundering campaign — largely played referee in the tussles between the two frontrunners.
Set against the backdrop of a border state, each of the four remaining Republican candidates called for heightened security measures to stem the tide of illegal immigration.
But Michigan, another crucial swing state with a primary on Tuesday, was also featured prominently, as Santorum and Romney defended their opposition to the federal bailout of the auto industry. Romney, the native son of Michigan who opposed the auto industry bailout, is in danger of losing the auto-dependent state to Santorum, which would easily mark his worst defeat in this election cycle.
