Rick Santorum is accusing the Republican congressional leadership of failing to adequately respond to the video of a Planned Parenthood employee discussing how fetal body parts are sold after abortions.
“This is why I sort of scratch my head at our leadership,” the Republican presidential candidate said Monday during a conversation with several reporters at a Capitol Hill restaurant. “Because they are so afraid of these issues.”
Speaker of the House John Boehner called for congressional hearings into the matter last week, but Santorum argues Congress should be moving faster to go after Planned Parenthood. Legislation targeting the organization should have already been voted on, he said.
“I would have had a vote on the floor of the Senate, if I was the Senate leader, to defund Planned Parenthood and have a debate on it,” he said. “As well as have hearings to see if there’s any criminal activity or criminal investigation that should pursued.”
Santorum, a former senator from Pennsylvania, suggested Republican leaders are pressured by some in the party not to emphasize pro-life issues, worried about the politics of it.
“You have a group of members and a group of donors who will climb down your throat if they do,” he said. “They just want to avoid these issues at all cost.”
“I don’t understand it,” Santorum added. “I don’t understand why we can’t point out the dehumanization that’s going on in this country. Because that’s what it is. It’s dehumanization.”
Santorum said Republicans are missing a big opportunity to go on offense against the pro-abortion lobby.
“For me, it’s an opportunity to expose the cruelty of abortion, as well as the hypocrisy of the people who are denying the reality of what occurs during abortion,” he said.
Also during Monday’s discussion, Santorum was asked about rival presidential candidate Donald Trump and the situation he finds himself in over his negative comments about Arizona Sen. John McCain’s service during Vietnam.
But Santorum said it was actually something else Trump said in Iowa over the weekend that has evangelicals suspicious of the businessman.
While discussing his Christian faith Saturday, Trump said he is religious but gave an awkward answer when asked if he’s ever asked for forgiveness from God. “I am not sure I have. I just go on and try to do a better job from there,” Trump said.
Santorum, who was also in Iowa last weekend, said he went to a church the next day in Oskaloosa, where a pastor expressed concern over Trump’s comments.
The senator didn’t directly criticize Trump directly over his statements on his faith.
“People have their own relationship with the Lord…I’m not judging anybody on their own faith walk,” he said.
But Santorum contrasted himself with Trump. “My faith walk is very different,” he said. “I apologize continually throughout the day — ask forgiveness for some of the things I think and occasionally some of the things I say and do.”
With all the attention on Trump, Santorum said he tries not to take the bait from the media to dump all over him. When he disagrees with a rival, Santorum says he tries to be “critical of what they say” but not be “critical of the person.”
“It provides fodder to the other side, and you’re playing to the press….The media wants blood out of Republicans,” he said.