Rick Santorum Announces Another Run For President In The 2016 Election

Former senator from Pennsylvania and presidential candidate in the 2012 election, Rick Santorum, has announced that he will seek the nomination for the Republican party in another bid for the White House, The New York Times reported. Santorum said at his presidential campaign kick off rally,

“Today is the day we are going to begin to fight back! I am proud to stand here among you and for you, the American workers, who have sacrificed so much, to announce that I am running for President of the United States.”

Rick Santorum made the announcement at a rally in Cabot, Pennsylvania on Wednesday, CNN reported. Santorum drew on his own blue collar experience in front of an audience of mostly blue collar workers from the Pennsylvania town. Santorum said at his rally in front a crowd of applauding followers,

“As middle America is hollowing out, we can’t sit idly by as big government politicians make it harder for our workers and then turn around and blame them for losing jobs overseas. American families don’t need another president tied to big government or big money,”

Rick Santorum, who has faced scrutiny for his socially conservative views, shied away from comments that more than likely put off many voters in the 2012 election. In an interview with ABC‘s George Stephanopoulos, Santorum stuck to his views on jobs for middle class Americans. Santorum said in the interview:

“It’s an exciting opportunity… To come back home, to be at a manufacturing facility, to really reconnect to what I grew up with and understood to be an America that worked, that worked for middle-income families, that created stable neighborhoods and strong families.

“When you see all these reports coming out, one after another, from the far left and the far right talking about how the middle of America is hollowing out and the jobs just aren’t there for the seventy-four percent of Americans who don’t have a college degree, families are breaking down.”

Rick Santorum ran an unexpectedly good campaign in the 2012 presidential election which found him leading the field for the Republican party during several state primaries. Longtime campaign strategist for Rick Santorum, John Brabender, said about Santorum and the entire presidential field for 2016 in an interview:

“The new candidates look great until people know more about them… The question comes, ‘Do you have a solid base that are strong supporters that are going to be there?’ He has to earn some of that back. I don’t think any of that is unusual, or daunting to us. We know what is under the surface.”

Rick Santorum’s 2012 presidential campaign was based in a grassroots fundraising effort. Santorum’s new campaign hopes to overcome any fundraising issues that he faced in his first go around for the White House now that he is better known politician.

[Photo credit: Jeff Swensen/ Getty Images News]