Rick Santorum slams JFK, Mitt Romney OK with being wealthy (+video)

Rick Santorum said that John F. Kennedy's 1960 speech on being a Catholic made Santorum want to "throw up." Mitt Romney defended his $250 million in assets.

By Steve Holland and Sam Youngman, Reuters / February 27, 2012

Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum, campaigns in Troy, Mich. Feb. 25, 2012,

(AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Traverse City, Mich.

In a tight race to win the Michigan primary, US. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney strongly defended his wealth on Sunday and challenged voters to support someone else if they did not like his success.

Related stories

In 1960, Massachusetts senator and presidential contender John F. Kennedy spoke before the Houston's Ministers Conference to allay concerns that, as a Catholic president, he would be taking orders from the Vatican.

Listen to JFK here give his speech in 1960 when he was a Senator running for the Presidency and was getting a lot of heat from people(like Romney now) because he was Catholic and the U.S. had never had a Catholic President before. People were worried that the Vatican was going to sway JFK's actions as President. The people were wrong as he explains here in this video of him talking before the

Meanwhile, Rick Santorum criticized John F. Kennedy's 1960 speech on keeping his faith separate from politics. Santorum, who hopes to become the second Roman Catholic US president, Kennedy's speech made him want to throw up.

Kennedy said religion and politics should be kept separate, which Santorum called an "absolutist doctrine" that he rejected. "I don't believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute," he said on ABC.

"To say that people of faith have no role in the public square? You bet that makes you throw up," Santorum said.

RECOMMEND: Seven Santorum culture war moments

Questions about Romney's high earnings and taxes have dogged him throughout the primary elections and came up again in the run-up to Tuesday's vote in Michigan, where main rival Santorum has presented himself as a blue-collar Republican.

Worth an estimated $250 million, Romney has been accused of being out of touch with most Americans' economic struggles and did himself no favors in Michigan on Friday when he said his wife drives "a couple of Cadillacs."

"I'm not perfect. I just am who I am," Romney said on "Fox News Sunday," when asked about the comment, in a Rust Belt state where unemployment is high.

"We have a car that we have in California. And we got a car that we have back in Boston, where our other home is. That's just the way it is," the former private equity executive said.

"If people think there's something wrong with being successful in America, then they better vote for the other guy. Because I've been extraordinarily successful, and I want to use that success and that know-how to help the American people."

Romney tried to draw a connection with blue-collar America by showing up at the Daytona 500 car race in Florida.

"This is kind of a fun thing for me to do," Romney told Sirius XM's NASCAR radio.

Just as Romney strolled out onto the track for photos and handshakes, the number 26 car, emblazoned with 'Santorum 2012' moved slowly past him into the pit lane.

Romney grew up in Michigan but faces a tough fight after opposing President Barack Obama's bailout of the U.S. auto industry.