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Rick Santorum’s recent surge in the polls has presented a dilemma for Pennsylvania lawmakers.Of the state’s 13 GOP House and Senate lawmakers, only one lawmaker has endorsed Santorum for the party’s presidential nomination.Rep. Glenn Thompson (R-Pa.) told The Hill this week that he decided to support Santorum several months ago. But that backing, up until now, has received no press attention. Furthermore, it has not been announced by the Santorum campaign. “Right after he first announced I had a conversation with him. He certainly had my support, financially and by attending a local event in the 5th district, as well...

The latest polls out of Iowa confirm two things as we head into the caucuses: Ron Paul has peaked, and his support is now on the downswing. And Rick Santorum is surging, going from single-digits to third place in a matter of days.If the Des Moines Register survey holds true, Santorum may just be getting started: The poll, conducted Tuesday through Friday, shows support at 24 percent for Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts; 22 percent for Paul, a Texas congressman; and 15 percent for the surging Rick Santorum, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania.But the four-day results don’t reflect...

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Winning over Iowa’s fickle voters is hard enough without spoiling their fun. On Friday afternoon, Rick Santorum pulled into a Buffalo Wild Wings sports bar here to perform the ritualistic, shared-identity pander of rooting for a local sports team with which the candidate has only a passing familiarity. The problem was that Santorum’s visit to Ames, home to Iowa State University, coincided with the biggest football game of the year. By the time the Cyclones and the Rutgers Scarlet Knights kicked off at the New Era Pinstripe Bowl, the bar was mobbed with a jumble of reporters, who hovered around...

Iowa: Santorum Surges, Romney Stable, Paul Dropping DEC 29, 2011 • BY STEPHEN F. HAYES Rick Perry’s presidential campaign released a tough new ad Thursday targeting Rick Santorum and his history of supporting earmarks in Congress. Why is Perry attacking a candidate who has been mired in single digits in Iowa despite living there for most of the past several months? Simple, Santorum is surging. A CNN poll of registered Iowa Republicans released Wednesday puts Santorum in third place with 16 percent of the vote – his highest share yet. It’s not an outlier. In fact, data from Perry’s internal...

This reminds me of that scene in the movie "The Perfect Storm," when the terrified meteorologist looks at the radar in panic and says, "It's happening!" At the start of the month, Rick Santorum needed the following things to happen in order for him to be competitive in Iowa: Newt Gingrich needed to fade. Evangelicals needed to move toward his campaign. Then voters needed to see some tangible sign of momentum, in order to speed up the tortoise-like pace of his Iowa campaign.

Some on the right have been pumping Rick Santorum relentlessly in the wake of Herman Cain's withdrawal from the GOP primary race. Now lo-and-behold, such new media bloggers can share much of the credit for the Pennsylvania Republican's unlikely rise in the Iowa polls over this last week, particularly those who got behind him early and/or put boots on the ground. Sure do love his platform... as I do Bachmann's. But the problem is that this 'Santorum surge' is coming purely at Newt's expense- and a direct result of underhanded scumbag Mitt Romney and his ma$$ive war chest, training the...

The extent to which Rick Santorum has gained in Iowa polling is not entirely clear. Although two polls have him with 16 percent of the vote, two others that were in the field at the same time have him at 10 and 11 percent, respectively.Nevertheless, Mr. Santorum can make the most credible claim of any candidate about having momentum in the state. Our forecast model actually tries to quantify momentum by looking at the trajectory of each candidate’s polling and assigns him a small bonus or penalty based upon it. Right now, Mr. Santorum is benefiting from that adjustment, while...

One poll is getting the big headlines this morning: NBC poll: Mitt Romney, Ron Paul neck-and-neck in Iowa; Newt Gingrich in 5th The numbers from that poll, conducted Tuesday and Wednesday: Romney 23% Paul 21% Santorum 15% Perry 14% Gingrich 13% Bachmann 6% Similar numbers from a Rasmussen poll conducted Wednesday: Romney 23% Paul 22% Santorum 16% Gingrich 13% Perry 13% Bachmann 5% Thesed results have been enough to move Santorum to third place in the Real Clear Politics average of Iowa polls, but there’s yet another poll — conducted Thursday by We Are America — which shows Santorum now...

CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA — The media has been abuzz about Rick Santorum since Wednesday, when a CNN/Time/ORC International poll showed support among likely Iowa GOP caucus-goers for the long-lagging Santorum more than tripling since the start of December, and an NBC/Marist poll released Thursday showed similar numbers. While these polls offered reporters a few interesting potential story lines—the Santorum surge (the CNN/Time poll put him at 16% support, or third place behind Mitt Romney and Ron Paul), a plunge in support for Newt Gingrich (to 14%, down from 33% at the start of the month), and Romney leading with 25%...

Veteran Republican consultant Mike Murphy tweets that the Rick Santorum surge is "real," suggesting that plurality support among social conservatives could put the former Pennsylvania senator in first or second place. Murphy considers Ron Paul's Iowa campaign "way over-rated," saying Paul might finish "[f]orth (sic), maybe third."