Less than two days after he met with national political reporters, Gov. Tim Pawlenty is being attacked by one of his potential opponents in the Republican 2012 presidential primary.
Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum told the National Review that Pawlenty was invoking "class-warfare" rhetoric by saying the GOP needs to get away from being the party of "country club elitists."
"I'm not a class-warfare guy," Santorum said. "That's the Democrats' gig. They like to divide and play the class card."
"We don't have classes in America — I don't even like the term middle class," Santorum told the magazine. "People are lower income or middle income, and the dynamism of this country is that you can rise, and sometimes fall, but you are not stuck in classes. We should not get into that kind of rhetoric, or showing some sort of prejudice."
In an hour-long interview at the Christian Science Monitor's breakfast Monday, Pawlenty had said the GOP needs to quash the stereotype that Republicans are "middle-aged, white guy CEOs" who "never get their fingernails dirty."
Santorum, who lost his senate re-election bid in 2006 by 18 points, has been considering a 2012 presidential run. Like the Minnesota governor, Santorum has been visiting Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, the early presidential primary and caucus states.
Santorum's knock on Pawlenty isn't the first dust-up among GOP presidential hopefuls: Earlier this month aides to Mtt Romney said that Sarah Palin was "not a serious human being." Palin aides responded that the remark was "counterproductive and frankly immature."
