Rick Santorum Suspends Campaign for Presidency

In the afternoon hours of April 10, Rick Santorum announced the suspension of his bid for the Republican Party presidential nomination. Only a few weeks ago, Santorum had pledged to continue his campaign, hoping to gain some momentum in May and build steam as the primary contests moved toward the nominating convention in the summer.

However, over the Easter holiday weekend, Santorum spent time with his three-year-old daughter who needed to be hospitalized. This is the second time during the campaign that his daughter has needed medical care. Santorum weighed the needs of his family against the hard reality that his campaigning efforts were not netting the number of delegates needed to surpass his leading rival, Mitt Romney. In his announcement speech, Santorum did not give any formal endorsement to Romney. At times in the past months of campaigning, the two men have verbally disagreed with each other over the appropriate Conservative alternative to President Obama.

Now that Santorum is out of the race, and considering that Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul are very far behind in the delegate count, political observers assume that this guarantees Mitt Romney will win the  Republican Party nomination to run against President Barack Obama in the general election this fall.

The next questions are:

1.) Will Santorum’s departure push Gingrich and Paul to also officially drop out of the race, clearing the way for Romney to make his Republican message clear and focus on Obama? Or will Gingrich and Paul see this as an opportunity to revitalize their campaigns and begin gathering delegates in Santorum’s absence?

2. ) What might Santorum’s political future hold? Will Romney consider him as a vice-presidential running mate? Even though their competition for the nomination was sometimes bitter, Santorum proved popular with a segment of the Republican voting population that Romney was not effectively able to reach. If Romney does offer the position of Vice Presidential candidate to Santorum (which likely would not be announced until this summer’s convention), would Santorum take it given his family concerns?

3.) How does the potential simplification of the Republican primary race affect President Obama’s campaign strategy? It seemed that he had been content to let the Republicans attack  each other during the primaries and debates while he continues making presidential decisions. Will he now be forced to more directly engage against Romney?