Rick Santorum was born in 1958 and grew up in Pennsylvania. He earned a B.A. in Political science at Penn State University, an M.B.A. at the University of Pittsburgh, and finally he was awarded with a Doctorate of Jurisprudence degree from the Dickinson School of Law in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He then went on to become an associate attorney in the law firm of Kirkpatrick and Lockhart.

From an early age, Santorum was involved in politics. During his time at Penn State he volunteered on the campiagns for the late Senator John Heinz. After that he went on to work, from 1981-1986, as an admistration assistant to Pennsylvanian State Senator J. Doyle Corman where he also served some time as Executive Director of the Senate Transportation Committee and the Senate Local Government Committee.

In 1990 he took a step up in his involvement and ran for U.S. Congress as a Republican against a Democrate incumbent in Pennsylvania's 18th district. It was through his grass roots efforts that he was elected in November of 1990.He went up for and won his re-election in 1992 and was finally elected to the U.S. Senate in 1994.

While in Congress, Santorum introduced legislation to cut spending and reduce the budget deficit. He strived for congressional accountability and fiscal responsibility and wanted to see something get done with health care reform. Ultimately his work was signed into law under the Health Insurance, Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. He next attacked the issue of breaking the long-term cycle of dependency on welfare. He aimed to get recipients to work for their benefits instead of just getting them for free.

Now in the Senate,Santorum still attempts to reform the welfare system and had the legislation he had started in the House passed in 1996. He was also instrumental in Pennsylvania's fight to keep their military bases and depots in the country's defense structure.

He currently lives in Pennsylvania Hills with his wife, Karen Garver and four children,Elizabeth Anne, Richard John ("Johnny"), Jr., Daniel James, and Sarah Maria.

A good friend of Santorum is the late Senator John Heinz who died tragically in a plane crash in 1991.

Between 1993 and 1998, Senator Santorum reportedly received $10,606,732 for his campaigns. He spent $9,083,555 of it and still has $1,560,158 on hand. A list of his main contributors can be found here . A list of individual contributions can be found here, and a list of PAC contributors can be found here.

47.3.3% of his contributions were large individual contributions of two hundred dollars or more. These donations were responsible for $5,013,156 of his funds. 30.3% of his contributions were small individual contributions of less than two hundred dollars. The small individual contributions accounted for $3,211,553 of his total funds. PACs contributed 19.4% of his funds or $2,059,220 and the last 3% were from other sources.

Santorum is a member of the Senate Banking Committee which handles all of theses issues. In additon to that he is also a member of the following subcommittees: Securities, Financial Institutions, and is the vice chairman of the subcommittee on Housing and Transportation