Santorum stands by opposition to auto bailouts in visit to Detroit

Rick Santorum stood by his opposition to the auto industry bailouts Thursday as he made a pitch to Michigan voters at the Detroit Economic Club.

"If we had just stayed out of it completely and let the market work, I believe the market would've worked," Santorum said, adding that if the industry had just been left alone, it would've been "alive, and I believe, better." 

Santorum also drew a contrast with rival Mitt Romney, who he said opposed the auto bailouts while supporting the rescue of Wall Street.

"My feeling was that the government should not be in support of bailouts, period," Santorum said.

The GOP presidential hopeful said President George W. Bush and President Obama set the "wrong precedent" with the bailouts of Chrysler and General Motors, decisions that he said would have negative “long-term consequences” for the country.

Criticizing the bailouts is a political risk in Michigan, which is now experiencing an improving economy thanks in part to the resurgence of the auto industry. Romney also opposed the bailouts, and published an op-ed in the Detroit News this week that blasted them as "crony capitalism on a grand scale." 

"The president tells us that without his intervention things in Detroit would be worse. I believe that without his intervention things there would be better," Romney wrote.

Recent polls have shown Santorum leading Romney in Michigan, which will hold its Republican primary on Feb. 28.

Santorum's speech covered his plans for tax reform, welfare reform, as well as oil drilling, especially as it relates to the Keystone pipeline. He reiterated his proposal to triple the child tax credit, which he said would help create the "strong families" needed for a healthy economy.

If elected president, Santorum said he would abolish the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax. He also promised to slash government spending by $5 trillion and balance the federal budget in five years. 

He also proposed giving individual states more power to design their welfare programs. 

"Cap it, cut it, freeze grant it for the states," Santorum said. 

Santorum said he would also abolish corporate taxes on manufacturers to discourage companies from moving jobs overseas. 

The former senator aimed most of his fire at President Obama, whom he said "is not interested in providing jobs, he's interested in providing benefits." 

Santorum is currently leading in a number of polls both nationally and in Michigan, the state where Romney was born and his father was governor. 

In an interview Wednesday, Romney said he wouldn’t lose the Michigan primary.

"That won't happen," he told the Grand Rapids News in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

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