Rick Santorum praised the grassroots efforts of his supporters after a pair of momentum-shifting wins in Mississippi and Alabama on Tuesday night, telling supporters in Louisiana that they were "defying the odds" in a primary in which they were out-spent and counted out.
"People have said, you know, you're being out-spent, and everybody's talking about all the math and that this race is inevitable. But for someone who thinks this race is inevitable, [Romney] spent a whole lot of money against me for being inevitable," Santorum said.
The two wins in Deep South primaries should help Santorum as he works to coalesce conservatives around his campaign as a viable alternative to Mitt Romney.
The former senator pledged that he would continue to campaign in primary events - including a two-day swing through Puerto Rico - because he believed he could secure the 1,144 delegates necessary to win the Republican nomination.
"We're campaigning everywhere there are delegates because we are going to win this nomination before that convention," Santorum said.
Santorum also thanked supporters for standing with him despite members of the media - and the Republican party - counting him out.
"All the establishment - all the establishment - being on the other side of this race, you stood with a guy that comes from the grandson of a steelworker from a steel town in Western Pennsylvania," Santorum said.
The moment was likely a veiled reference to the candidate's suggestion earlier Tuesday that Fox News - a dominant force in conservative political news - was biased in favor of Romney's candidacy.
Santorum went on to urge conservatives "to pull together" in a campaign "about ordinary folks doing extraordinary things, sort of like America."
"You do your job next week, we will nominate a conservative and if we nominate a conservative we will defeat Barack Obama," Santorum said.
