Santorum estimates he's raised half a million dollars just since yesterday morning

His three wins yesterday were bound to give his fundraising numbers a boost today — but Rick Santorum says a steady stream of dollars started to pour in even before his polling numbers began to rise.

“We’ve had a great 24 hours,” Santorum told CBS News in an interview. “My guess is we’ve raised—I haven’t heard exactly, but my guess is we’re in around a half-million dollars since [Tuesday] morning. So we’ve had a good day and we’ve had a good couple of weeks, you know, finishing in the teens in Nevada and Florida and yet, our fundraising was increasing as our numbers were not in those two states.

“And I think that gave us the impression that we could do well on Tuesday and we put a lot of time and energy into those three states. I’m not lying about that. We rolled the dice last night and obviously it paid off.”

Perhaps donors sensed the impending victories in the middle of the country.

Rick Santorum’s Super PAC — the Red, White and Blue Fund — had a good day, too:

“We’ve been working at a speed faster than any other day the super PAC has seen in this election season,” Stuart Roy, a political advisor to the Red White and Blue Fund, wrote in an email to the Los Angeles Times/Tribune Washington Bureau. “We haven’t made a single fundraising call today because potential donors have been the ones calling us.” …

Roy said the incoming resources would allow the super PAC to do voter advocacy and polling in states it had not originally planned to target.

“The final decisions haven’t yet been made on television ad placement but we are taking a hard look at states that may have previously been viewed as completely uphill…both ways,” Roy wrote. “For instance, a couple of the Southern states are in play since [Mitt] Romney’s Northeastern politics don’t play well there.  And although [Newt] Gingrich may look a bit like Paula Deen, politically he’s no Southerner.”

Nevertheless, while Santorum told CNN’s Erin Burnett “We’re going to have the money we need to make the case we want to make,” the reality is he’s still going up against a very monied man. As just one measure of Mitt Romney’s formidable financial advantage, he has the support of 17 American billionaires.

Then again, Santorum has Foster Friess, who describes himself as a “billionaire wannabe.” The guy might not be a billionaire, but he’s worth more than $500 million, outspoken in support of Santorum and quite likable himself. Could he single-handedly bankroll an actual Santorum nomination? Maybe. At the very least, his example alone could be a powerful inducement to donate to what has primarily been perceived as a long-shot campaign.

Rick Santorum has also proved his prowess at the retail politics approach; he’s willing to put in the hours and effort that money can’t buy. It also seems safe to bet he’ll use his money well — he won’t waste it on attack ads that backfire. The mudslinging at him might begin, but Santorum will stay focused on the issues, just as he has so far.