On the morning of Feb. 28, political reporters were focused on Michigan. In just a few hours, the Republican presidential candidates would be tested in Michigan’s Republican primary.
Tensions were high as the candidates attempted to rally more voters.
Like Texas, Michigan has an open primary. In open primaries, voters do not need to be registered with the party in order to vote. So in this election, when only the Republicans are holding primaries, registered Democrats are allowed to vote in the primary as well.
Rick Santorum’s political action committee, Freedom’s Defense Fund, began sending automated phone calls to Michigan Democrats just hours before voting began. The phone calls directed attention to Romney’s opposition to an auto industry bailout in 2009, a very contentious issue for unionized and financially hurting Michigan auto industry workers.
The voice on the recording encouraged Democrats to vote against Romney in the open primary. It used inflammatory language too, pointing out that, “Romney supported the bailouts for his Wall Street billionaire buddies, but opposed the auto bailouts. That was a slap in the face to every Michigan worker.”
The call ad failed to mention that Santorum also opposed the bailout. At the end of the recording, the call claimed to be supported by “hard-working Democratic men and women and paid for by Rick Santorum for president.”
Needless to say, Mitt Romney was not happy about this last minute line of attack, using Democrats to tip the balance in the Republican primary.
We see Santorum’s automated calls as an interesting political ploy, but not necessarily dirty politics. Michigan voters chose to have an open primary, so this kind of voting is perfectly legal. Santorum was only trying to harness a portion of the primary electorate that Mitt Romney had neglected.
However, the fact that many states have closed primaries shows that open primaries themselves are not fully accepted. After all, most registered Democrats would not vote for the Republican candidate in the presidential election, so why should they help select the Republican candidate in a primary?
In this way, we understand Romney’s frustration. We also see Santorum’s phone calls as intentionally deceitful. When the calls chastised Romney for going against the auto bailout, it implied that Santorum supported Michigan by voting for the bailout. Furthermore, Santorum often touts his own deeply conservative values, and all of the candidates in the Republican primaries have tried to distinguish themselves as the most conservative. Therefore, either Santorum’s appeal to Michigan Democrats or his position as the most conservative candidate is insincere.
The word choice was also inflammatory. Santorum’s call ad honed in on a divisive factor that has plagued Romney almost this entire campaign: Romney’s wealth.
In effect, not only did the call attempt to deceive the voters, it also highlighted Romney’s wealth in a way that would seem offensive to most financially hurting auto industry workers and galvanize voters against Romney.
Santorum defended his actions as a way to attract Democratic voters for the general election, but still came in second place in the primary. Considering Romney barely came out victorious suggests that Santorum’s politics were at least partially successful. In fact, 9 percent of voters in the primary identified as Democrats.
Democratic participation is already encouraged in Michigan’s open primary, however Santorum failed to reach Democrats on appropriate terms. In the end, the calls were probably less offensive than many political smear campaign ads and they were completely legal. Everyone knows politics is a dirty game but does Santorum really want to be known as a person who deceives voters and garners temporary and insincere support in a roundabout way?
