Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum said Tuesday that his long-shot bid for the White House "is on the ascendancy at the right time."
Santorum, speaking to reporters after a speech to the 7th District Republican Party in Duluth, said he feels momentum in Iowa, the state that will kick off the 2012 voting in January.
This, he said, is the time to peak.
"Your time comes at the right time, which is when people are voting instead of in the middle of summer when you peak too early," he said.
The most recent polling in Iowa has Santorum running seventh in an eight-person field.
Santorum also kept up his criticism of former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich over the former Georgia congressman's position on illegal immigration. Gingrich recently said the country needs a humane way of dealing with millions of immigrants who came to the country illegally but who have put down deep roots in their communities.
"He said millions of people who came to this country illegally will be able to stay," said Santorum, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania. "I don't know what your definition of amnesty is, but if your definition of amnesty is people who came here illegally will be able to stay here legally, then it's amnesty."
In a 20-minute speech to about 75 local Republicans, Santorum said the party must remember that lower taxes and limited government alone won't solve the country's ills.
"We have lower taxes and limited government, and is everything all right in communities where there are no dads?" Santorum said. "No, there’s increased crime, unemployment is high, etc. and etc. So no, everything is not fine."
"You cannot have limited government without a good, decent moral society," he said. "It cannot exist."
To solve poverty in America, Santorum said, "get people to marry. In two-parent families in America, the poverty rate today, in the third year of a recession, is 8 percent."
Single parents, he said, while often "heroic people," are much more likely to fall into poverty, and their children go with them.
Santorum said that as president, he would lower the individual income tax and cut corporate taxes in half.
"We take the corporate tax and eliminate it for manufacturers," he said. "Why? Because I think most people want to see ‘Made in America' again for the things they buy. Most people are tired of losing our jobs because we can’t compete."
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