Santorum allies hit Huckabee and Paul

A new super-PAC ad supporting Rick Santorum attacks fellow 2016 GOP candidates Mike Huckabee and Sen. Rand Paul on national defense and education.

The new ad from Working Again PAC targets the Kentucky Republican’s foreign policy chops, panned by many party hawks as non-interventionist.

“In face of radical Islam, some like Rand Paul, would continue America’s retreat, while Rick Santorum continues to call for a stronger national defense,” the ad says. 

It then immediately shifts gears to panning Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor who came in second for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

“On education, Mike Huckabee supported Common Core, something Rick Santorum has always been against,” it continues, noting the controversial education standards that’ve been decried by conservatives as a national takeover of local education.

The ad, one of the first negative targeted spots of the cycle, attacks two candidates that are within striking distance of Santorum in the polls. With next month’s main debate stage only open to the top 10 candidates, the former Pennsylvania senator will likely need to improve his standing in order to get a much-sought-after podium on the stage.

Huckabee, who finished second just four years before Santorum did in 2012, is competing for a similar swath of Evangelical Christian and other “values” voters as Santorum. And Paul has been a target of Santorum’s in the past because of his Libertarian-leaning views.

The spot ends by touting Santorum’s goal of protecting working families and “end the immigration crisis.”

“Rick Santorum, the one conservative conservatives can trust,” the ad closes.