Contact: Bob Sturm, 703-396-6974; Ryan Rogge, 703-396-6971; After 6 PM Eastern & on weekends, Bob Sturm, 703-307-8176; Ryan Rogge, 703-674-6948

MANASSAS, Va., Feb. 11, 2012 /Christian Newswire/ -- At a private lunch during the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, D.C., Rick Santorum assured 90 national conservative leaders that, if he won the Republican presidential nomination, he would not move to the political center.

Richard A. Viguerie, Chairman of ConservativeHQ.com, said, "Rick Santorum was the only candidate to come before CPAC and say conservative principles are the things that win elections."

"If you want to understand why conservatives are backing Rick Santorum, look no further than the enthusiastic response he received at CPAC when he said that 'personnel is policy' and that 'conservatives aren't merely a wing of the Republican Party -- they are the Republican Party'," observed Viguerie.

"In his public speech at CPAC, and at a private luncheon with 90 national conservative leaders, Rick Santorum said he would campaign for the Republican nomination as a conservative, run against Barack Obama as a conservative, and govern as a conservative," Viguerie said.

"When Rick Santorum came before conservative leaders and said he 'would not walk away from the conservative movement. It is who I am. I don't have a pollster. I do what I do from the heart, not because some consultant or focus group tells me this is what to do or what to say,' he rejected the content-free, run-to-the-center campaign the establishment and the media always demand from Republicans," he said.

"That is why the majority of conservative leaders and grassroots conservatives, starting with the January 13 meeting in Texas, are leaving the sidelines and backing Rick Santorum for President," Viguerie concluded.

NOTE TO EDITORS: Richard A. Viguerie pioneered political direct mail and has been called "one of the creators of the modern conservative movement" (The Nation) and one of the "conservatives of the century" (Washington Times). He is the author of Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause.