Santorum left open the possibility of a 2016 run, but didn’t commit. In Iowa, Santorum knocks the GOP

Former presidential hopeful Rick Santorum returned to Iowa for the first time since campaigning for Mitt Romney in the last presidential election and criticized the GOP for being “tone deaf” and failing to reach working Americans during that campaign.

Speaking at a local Republican fundraiser, Santorum said the party was wrong to focus too strongly on “job creators” and not enough on “job holders,” according to video of the event on Ustream.


“I think we have become tone deaf to America,” Santorum said, adding he is particularly concerned about the direction of the GOP.

( PHOTOS: Rick Santorum’s career)

Santorum said the night he spoke at the Republican National Convention last year, all the seats had placards that said, “we built this” and featured “businessperson after businessperson talking about how they built their business.”

“They didn’t have one person who worked behind the counter or on the factory floor come up and say, ‘I built this, too, and the guy that I work for gave me the opportunity to build it,’” Santorum said.

While businesspeople deserve praise, he said, it’s a narrow view.

“If all we do is focus on the job creators and not the job holders, we’re talking to a very small group of people,” Santorum said.

There are “working men and women” who don’t want to vote for President Barack Obama’s policies, Santorum said, but the GOP is failing to reach them.

“What we did not do in the last election and what we do not do as a party is talk to the folks who want to be with us, but they think we don’t care about them because we don’t talk to them,” Santorum said.

The former candidate’s return to the early primary state, where in 2012 he visited all 99 counties on his way to a surprise win in the caucuses, has sparked speculation for the 2016 presidential race. Santorum left open the possibility of a run but didn’t commit.

“I’m not doing anything that’s inconsistent with running, but I have a little time to decide how this all works together for me and my family and whether it’s the right time for me to do this,” he told the Des Moines Register. “Let’s get through the next election, and then we’ll figure it out.”

Santorum was the feature speaker at the event, which included Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa). It was the first of a three-day swing in the state, which will include a stop at the Iowa State Fair on Friday and a speech at the Family Leadership Summit on Saturday.