Santorum, Huntsman Take Aim at Romney Over Primary Dates

GOP presidential hopefuls Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman joined forces Thursday to launch a blistering attack on rival candidate Mitt Romney following reports the former Massachusetts governor lobbied states to move up their primary dates.

"It certainly seems to me that someone ... is trying to run this clock down and Governors Romney and Rick Perry would be the ones, as the folks at the top of the polls, would be the ones who would be most logical to have the shortest amount of time between now and the primaries to benefit from that," charged Santorum in an appearance on Fox News.

Saying that his campaign benefits from slow and steady progress, he added, "I'm just saying we should look into this and find out what is the truth, and if Governor Romney is doing this, I think he owes an apology to the people."

The Las Vegas Review Journal reported Wednesday that Romney's campaign pushed Nevada Republicans to move their caucus into January in hopes that Romney would maintain some momentum coming out of New Hampshire, a state he expects to win.

The Nevada GOP moved its GOP presidential caucus to Jan. 14, but former Gov. Robert List, the national committeeman on the state board, insisted to the Las Vegas Review Journal that "we moved the date for the good of Nevada, not the Romney campaign."

"Based on what's coming out of Nevada, there was some part of the Romney campaign that influenced the Nevada process .. and pushed them to declare earlier," Huntsman told Fox News, appearing after Santorum.

Romney's campaign released a statement in its defense.

"Governor Romney is running a national campaign and is prepared to compete in every state. He believes that Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucus and New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation primary should be preserved, and he looks forward to competing in every other nominating contest - whenever they are scheduled. To be clear, states determine when their contests will be held. Gov. Romney has always supported Nevada's status as an early nominating contest," the statement reads.

New Hampshire and Iowa host the traditional first-in-the nation primary and caucus, respectively. The Nevada decision could force either state, or both, to move their contest dates up.

Santorum raised concerns of having to deal with campaigning during the holidays, and called the whole situation a "travesty" and added, "It's being done by somebody who's trying to move this thing forward for some political gain because it makes no sense for these states to be moving this quickly and to push this up into the Christmas season."