Get the door, it's Tom Monaghan. And he's delivering family values to Mitt Romney in 30 minutes or less.
The former Domino's Pizza owner and noted anti-abortion activist today cast his lot with the struggling Romney campaign, which, using its own internal nomenclature, has yet to win a gold medal in a state larger than Wyoming.
Romney is coming of back-to-back second-place finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire, places where he once appeared a lock to win. The good news is that he lost those states to two different candidates, Mike Huckabee and John McCain, meaning the GOP race is still relatively wide open.
Monaghan is the wealthy Michigan businessman who, among other things, launched Ava Maria School of Law in Ann Arbor, which was intended to be a conservative counterweight to liberal-leaning law schools. He also runs an anti-abortion political action committee. He is building his own town in southeastern Florida to house his academic and philanthropic ventures.
Many prominent Catholic lawyers, including Mary Ann Glendon, recently nominated by the White House to serve as U.S ambassador to the Vatican, have joined up with the Romney effort because of the candidate's anti-abortion stance.
The Michigan Republican primary is Jan. 15.
"As someone who values the importance of faith in one's life, I recognize in Mitt his deep religious convictions which will serve him well in facing the critical moral issues facing our society," Monaghan said in a statement. " I believe he will stand firm on the pro-life issues and for the traditional family values that our country was founded on and which are so critical to the future of our nation."
Romney and Monaghan met each other in 1998, when Monaghan sold Domino's to Romney's Bain Capital for $1 billion.