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Santorum’s Earmark Record

How bad was Rick Santorum’s record on pork? I look at that in my homepage piece today:

There’s no way to know for sure how many earmarks Santorum requested, since lawmakers weren’t required to attach their names to earmark requests until 2007. (Santorum served in the Senate from 1995 to 2007.) The Club for Growth, in its presidential white-paper series, claims that Santorum “requested billions of dollars for pork projects,” while the Perry campaign is alleging that Santorum requested over $1 billion in earmarks. Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, views the $1 billion–plus figure as a plausible estimate. “As a matter of fact, I would probably peg it probably a little higher,” he says.

New on The Corner. . .


COMMENTS   6

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   01/06/12 10:56

Well my fellow conservatives there you go: your pure as the wind driven snow Santorum is a porker feeding at the government trough to the tune of $1 billion!

Santorum seems to be a good Catholic, but a lousy conservative!

A Santorum presidency would be a sequel to big spending Bush's:

"No Child Left Behind II: The Revenge Of Compassionate Conservatism"

"Watch our champion lecture Tea Party demonstrators and claim they have no heart for opposing federal government paid for school breakfast, lunch and dinner."

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   01/06/12 11:06

...yesterday, in the conference room at National Romney Online...

"Our Santorum push has gone too far, he's pushed down Paul, but he's now near our boy Mitt."

"Whack-a-mole engaged."

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kensnyder
   01/06/12 11:30

I'm sure that everyone busting out the "big government conservative" label for Santorum were sending letters to their congressman back in the early 2000's decrying the amount of pork they voted for. Name me a congressman that wasn't putting pork and earmarks in legislation back then when we were fat dumb and happy. I'm from PA and this is a state that vote Happy Jack Murtha into office from 1974 on. Cracking on Santorum for earmarks seems like a non-issue at this point.

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   01/06/12 11:35

The truth about Santorum will come out just like it did with Gingrich. The only problem is by the end of the month the race will be over.

Can it be that Huntsman is the most conservative candidate left? He's really the only logical alternative to Romney at this point.

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   01/06/12 11:43

Even supposing Santorum pushed for $1 billion in earmarks in his political career, that's still only 0.07 percent of THIS YEAR'S deficit, which is itself one percent of our unfunded liabilities.

Santorum has a record of reforming entitlements, which is still better than Romney's continued defense of the state-level precursor to Obamacare.

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dpetty
   01/06/12 12:51

Just before the voters of PA kicked him out of office, Santorum accepted more money from lobbyists than anyone else in congress. In his final year, he got more than Hillary Clinton and Tom Delay combined!

External Link 

Rick Santorum was one of The Most Corrupt Politicians in Congress!

11 Pages of Hard Evidence of Rick Santorum's Corruption in Congress:
External Link 

Taking money from corporations to pass bills, Being a Senator in Pennsylvania and living in virginia, Taking money from schools to put his own children through private school, etc. etc.

External Link 

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