Mitt Romney has turned his sights on Rick Santorum's home state, and his campaign plans to begin airing ads in most of Pennsylvania starting this week, a campaign source has told
the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
The $2.9 million advertising campaign will begin Monday in the Wilkes-Barre, Scranton, Erie, Altoona and Philadelphia media markets until the state's primary election on April 24, the Tribune-Review reported. Pittsburgh will start seeing the ads in the next week.
The super PAC Restore Our Future, which supports the former Massachusetts governor, is airing commercials on cable channels statewide.
Romney, though, is a realist. He acknowledged that he expects Santorum to win Pennsylvania's primary but thinks Pennsylvania voters will elect him president this fall.
"Look, we all want to win our home states," Romney told the Tribune-Review. "I won Massachusetts, [Newt] Gingrich won Georgia and I expect that Mr. Santorum will win Pennsylvania."
Santorum's ads will begin soon, though not on Monday, his senior strategist, John Brabender of Pittsburgh, told the Tribune-Review. "We put a higher preference on meeting with the voters than just running negative ads," Brabender said.
Romney's three Republican rivals all have ties to Pennsylvania. Santorum grew up in Butler County and owns a Penn Hills home, Gingrich spent childhood years in the Harrisburg area and Ron Paul is a Green Tree native.
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