Here are ten things you need to know today.
- Santorum continues to hit Romney on health care: On the trail in Wisconsin Sunday night, Rick Santorum continued to push the idea that Mitt Romney’s own history with health care in Massachusetts makes him a weak candidate to stand up to ‘Obamacare,’ saying, it makes him the “worst Republican in the country to put up against Barack Obama.”
- Santorum swears at reporter: Rick Santorum swore at New York Times reporter Jeff Zeleny Sunday night when asked about his assertion that Romney would be the “worst” candidate to run against President Obama. According to Zeleny, Santorum responded to the question with “Quit distorting my words. It’s bullshit.”
- Santorum raising money off willingness to ‘take on’ the Times: Around 1a.m. Monday, the Santorum campaign fired off an email, framing the remarks he made to a New York Times reporter as taking a stand against the liberal media and asking for donations over the incident. Team Romney, meanwhile, took to Twitter Sunday night to mock Santorum’s short temper.
- Obama camp reaches out to Latinos on health care: Monday, the Obama for America campaign will release a bilingual report on how health care reform affects Hispanics, including a new Spanish-language “health care personalization tool.” The report will be introduced in a press conference call with the campaign. The release is in keeping with a month-long push on the two-year anniversary of health care reform’s passage to shore up support for the bill among core constituencies.
- Mike Lee endorses Mitt Romney: Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) endorsed Mitt Romney, saying “I think we would be well-advised as Republicans to start getting behind our eventual nominee.” Lee came into office in 2010 riding the Tea Party wave and railing against Romney-backed policies like TARP. The DNC thought the irony was enough to issue a statement: “Just two years after basing his insurgent campaign for Senate against Republican Senator Bennett’s vote for TARP, which he called the ‘largest redistribution of wealth ever encapsulated in one piece of legislation,’ Senator Mike Lee tomorrow is endorsing the TARP-supporting Mitt Romney for president.”
- Romney way up in California poll: In California, Republican primary voters back Mitt Romney by double digits, 42% to Rick Santorum’s 23%, according to a new poll conducted for the LA Times and USC. That’s a 15-point improvement since the last LA Times/USC Poll in November, when Herman Cain was up in the polls. However, the poll shows voters are not very enthusiastic about their options.
- Newt defends his Trayvon Martin comments: On Friday, Newt Gingrich lashed out at President Obama’s comments on Trayvon Martin as “dividing up the country” and injecting race into the tragedy. On Sunday, the campaign released a statement from senior Gingrich campaign strategist Kiron Skinner, described as “an African American scholar,” saying that Newt’s handling of the affair and his calls for justice are “one more reason why I have endorsed Speaker Gingrich’s presidential campaign.”
- Bachmann will watch over health care hearing: Michele Bachmann has a ticket to the Supreme Court hearings on the law which begin Monday.”And I have a ticket. I will be in the Supreme Court chamber to hear these oral arguments live,” Bachmann said Sunday, adding, “I was the chief author of the bill to repeal Obamacare, the first member of Congress to do so.”
- New ad for Tester in Montana: Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), facing a tough re-election bid this fall, is up with a new statewide ad in Montana. The ad shows Tester working on a tractor and explaining that in Montana, all the partisanship in Washington seems “ridiculous.” He promises to do what’s right, no matter which party gets credit.
- Gingrich begins a campaign swing in Delaware: Newt Gingrich begins a week-long campaign swing Monday in Delaware. From there he’ll head to Maryland, North Carolina, and Washington, DC. Newt and Callista Gingrich will campaign together in Wisconsin starting on Thursday, the campaign announced.
