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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defying personal and professional pressures, Rick Santorum is returning to the U.S. presidential campaign trail in his uphill battle against presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney. After a five-day break to celebrate Easter, help care for his sick daughter and thrash out strategy, Santorum kicks off the fight for his home state, Pennsylvania, in earnest on Tuesday. He needs to win the state by a decent margin to stay in the race against Romney, whose allies have already begun negative TV attacks against the conservative former senator. Santorum holds a rally in Bedford on Tuesday and then addresses...

(Snip) Though Gingrich and Romney throughout January engaged in some of the most personal attacks of the presidential primary campaign, Gingrich said Sunday that the two are at peace with one another. "I hit him as hard as I could, he hit me as hard as he could -- turned out he had more things to hit with than I did," Gingrich said. "That's part of the business." Gingrich said that if Romney wins 1,144 delegates and clinches the nomination, he will do "everything I can" to support him going into November. "We are absolutely committed to defeating Barack Obama,"...

Rick Santorum predicted Monday on the eve of the Wisconsin primary that he may “sneak in and have an upset.” “We feel good that we’re going to have a good result here in Wisconsin — we’re going to have a strong showing, maybe even sneak in and have an upset,” Santorum said from Green Bay, Wis., in an interview with Fox News. “But either way, we’ll have a strong showing in the face of obviously overwhelming money and overwhelming establishment support [for Romney].” The former Pennsylvania senator, who is trailing Romney in the delegate race, was dismissive of the increasing...

By the time Mitt Romney arrives in Wisconsin Friday – his first campaign stop in the state before its GOP primary on Tuesday – his challenger Rick Santorum will have already become a familiar face. Mr. Santorum has been in Wisconsin since last weekend and has dined, bowled, and played shuffleboard with residents in every pocket of the state. He’s even tossed a football at Lambeau Field, home of the Green Bay Packers. Santorum’s once-generous lead in Wisconsin is eroding. In February, the former US senator polled at 34 percent among the state’s likely Republican voters, while Mr. Romney, the...

<p>NBC News is being excoriated in some circles – with competitor Fox News Channel leading the charge – for selectively editing audio of the 911 call placed by George Zimmerman just before he killed Trayvon Martin.</p> <p>The NBC segment in question featured anchor Ron Allen and ran on the Today show on Tuesday. On Thursday, Sean Hannity and guest Brent Bozell played the NBC version of the 911 call and compared it with the unedited version.</p>

Wisconsin GOP: Romney 44%, Santorum 34%, Gingrich 7%, Paul 7% The numbers have moved little over the past week with Mitt Romney still holding a double-digit lead over Rick Santorum in the closing days of the Wisconsin Republican Primary race. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Republican Primary Voters in Wisconsin shows Romney with 44% support to Santorum’s 34%. A week ago in Wisconsin, it was Romney 46% and Santorum 33%. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Congressman Ron Paul both pick up seven percent (7%) of the vote from Badger State Republicans, virtually unchanged from the...

If Mitt Romney was harmed by the “Etch A Sketch” comment made by one of his advisers or by his loss in Louisiana over the weekend, it doesn’t seem to be preventing him from being in position to win in Wisconsin, which holds its primary on Tuesday. Mr. Romney now leads the polls in Wisconsin, a state that had once seemed relatively favorable for Rick Santorum. A survey from Marquette University, released on Tuesday, gave Mr. Romney an eight-point lead in the state. That is a slightly smaller margin than the one in an earlier Rasmussen Reports poll, which had...

A federal grand jury has indicted four more women over a rash of bizarre beard-cutting incidents against fellow Amish in Ohio, the US Justice Department said Wednesday. A total of 16 people -- 10 men and six women -- have now been accused in what prosecutors called five "religiously-motivated assaults" between September and November. The four new defendants named were Lovina Miller, Kathryn Miller, Emma Miller and Elizabeth Miller, who had not previously been charged. They are all married to nephews of Samuel Mullet, the accused ringleader of the attacks. The 10-count superseding indictment also adds charges against some of...

Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney is attacking rival Rick Santorum as a friend of "big labor" as they campaign in Wisconsin, where a fight over labor unions is fueling a bitter recall effort aimed at Gov. Scott Walker. Santorum, in turn, is aligning himself with the embattled Republican governor, a play for a party base that he hopes will carry him to victory in the GOP presidential primary on Tuesday. "As you know the fight against big labor led by Gov. Walker isn't over, here in Wisconsin," a voice says in an automated Romney telephone call. "I was shocked to...

The Supreme Court's conservative justices Tuesday laid into the requirement in the Obama administration's healthcare law that Americans have health insurance, as the court began a much-anticipated second day of arguments on the controversial legislation. Even before the administration's top lawyer could get three minutes into his defense of the mandate, some justices accused the government of pushing for excessive authority to require Americans to buy anything. "Are there any limits," asked Justice Anthony Kennedy, one of three conservative justices whose votes are seen as crucial to the fate of the unprecedented insurance mandate. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr....

For a while, it had seemed that Rick Santorum’s crabby days were behind him. Gone were the sarcastic potshots at reporters and peevish outbursts aimed at his political opponents. He had transformed into the Mr. Rogers of the presidential race: good-natured, self-deprecating and downright likable. But that nice-guy image has gone down the drain lately, with a series of provocative remarks and testy exchanges that have coincided with his slipping presidential fortunes. He may have hit a low point Sunday, when he uttered an expletive in response to a question from a New York Times reporter. Asked what he meant...

Facing heightened pressure to revive his presidential bid, Rick Santorum was forced to explain another apparent misstep as he courted Louisiana voters Friday, the eve of a critical contest in a Republican nomination battle that increasingly favors Mitt Romney. Santorum said he would support the eventual GOP nominee - if it isn't him - despite what he insists are similarities between front-runner Romney and President Barack Obama that make them indistinguishable on some issues. He caused an intraparty uproar earlier in the week after suggesting he'd prefer a second term for Obama over a Romney presidency. "I've said repeatedly and...

Somewhere, buried in Rick Santorum’s fatally flawed campaign messaging, were winning words. Had he committed to them, the former senator could have derailed Mitt Romney’s path to the GOP nomination. Despite Romney’s overpowering resources and organization, Santorum’s potent argument — that the party could not throw the issue of healthcare away by nominating someone who had supported mandates — was his key to victory, but he threw it away. As he transformed from Senator 2 Percent to the last credible alternative to Romney, Santorum often made the point that nominating Romney — or Newt Gingrich — would take the issue...

CHICAGO — On the issue Republicans tell pollsters is the most important of 2012, Rick Santorum these days has very little to say. His typical stump speech, an almost hour-long mixture of Orwellian fears of government overreach, history lessons about the French and Middle Eastern revolutions and suggestions that President Barack Obama would rather side with Islamists than Americans, has evolved into a tour de force of building fear in his listeners. Since winning primaries in Alabama and Mississippi, Santorum’s standard remarks have generally excluded an economic plan — the heart and soul of the message his chief GOP rival,...

Mitt Romney leads the Illinois Republican presidential primary with 44%. Romney is followed by Rick Santorum with 30%, Newt Gingrich with 13%, and Ron Paul with 8%. Romney leads Santorum 45% to 35% among self-identified Republicans, followed by Gingrich with 12% and Paul with 4%. Among self-identified independents and Democrats, Romney leads with 42%, followed by Paul with 20%, Gingrich with 17%, and Santorum with 16%. Romney leads Santorum 51% to 36% among likely Republican primary voters saying they have voted in early voting or by absentee ballot. Romney leads Santorum 43% to 30% among those saying they will vote...

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has the lead in Illinois but lots of voters are still trying to decide in the final days before the state’s GOP Primary. The first Rasmussen Reports poll in the state shows Romney at 41% and Rick Santorum at 32%. Trailing further back are Newt Gingrich at 14% and Ron Paul at seven percent (7%).

These results are based on Gallup Daily tracking interviews conducted March 8-15 with more than 1,900 Republican registered voters, including a sample of 290 Gingrich supporters. Some conservative Republicans have called for Gingrich to drop out of the race on the assumption that conservative primary voters would then unite behind Santorum as the conservative alternative to the more moderate Romney. But Gallup data indicate that Gingrich voters would not be likely to coalesce behind Santorum, suggesting that factors other than candidate ideology may be attracting voters to Gingrich, Santorum, and Romney. Gallup can simulate Republican preferences without Gingrich in the...

Arlen Specter survived a 2004 primary challenge with help from Rick Santorum, and now Santorum's former Senate colleague is only too grateful in a forthcoming memoir. Manu Raju got an early look: According to Specter, Santorum was “vital” in his 2004 primary win against conservative Pat Toomey, tried to provide him with political advice ahead of a career-changing vote in 2009, and lobbied him to quell a conservative rebellion over judicial nominees. “Santorum’s support and assurances to conservatives, along with President Bush’s, had given a vital boost in my beating Toomey,” Specter said in his new book, “Life Among the...

(snip) It is very clear to me that the media is trying to do all it can to keep the debate alive between Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich. It makes great financial sense to the networks, cable operators and local stations to see all of this continue. As much as the pundits out front on nightly news programs lament about the use of Super PAC money, an extended primary race means that many more profitable “attack” ads will flood the airwaves and bring new life to broadcasters’ profit and loss statements during a period of the year that...

GOP being Punk’d? We know that Democrats are crossing over in open primaries, such as Mississippi and Alabama, in order to vote for Rick Santorum, a big union candidate, their votes intended to throw the Republican National Convention into a contested balloting process. This tactic was written up at the Daily Kos. Big union money has even invested for the Santorum campaign. Pardon me for not having all the pertinent facts and I confess I don’t even have time to search for them all, today, to say nothing of presenting and formatting them, here. Can you help? Place further information...