June 27, 2009
SC governor’s Argentina
trip raises questions
ABC News – Gov. Sanford’s Salvage Effort
AP – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford tries to keep the media back as he makes his way to the Statehouse after …
By JIM DAVENPORT, Associated Press Writer
COLUMBIA, S.C. – The details of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford’s secretive trips to visit his lover in South America aren’t just headline fodder or political kryptonite.
They’re also being scrutinized by law enforcement officials at the request of some lawmakers and watchdog groups who fear taxpayer money could have been misused on his affair. So far, no criminal investigation has been opened.
On Thursday, Sanford agreed to reimburse the state for part of a more-than $8,000 tab that enabled him to see his mistress on an official economic development trip to Argentina’s capital city. At a Cabinet meeting Friday, he told the head of the state Commerce Department he was sorry about the trip.
The department had initially included only Brazil on the official itinerary but added meetings in Buenos Aires at the governor’s behest, said Kara Borie, a spokeswoman for the state Commerce Department.
Sanford did conduct business in Buenos Aires, although Borie said there were no specific economic development projects that have come from them.
“I will tell you that visits of this nature are not that uncommon,” she said, noting the results aren’t always immediately evident.
But the furor over Sanford’s trip is mushrooming. Critics called on the State Law Enforcement Division to investigate state spending on the trip and whether Sanford broke laws by leaving on his latest visit to Argentina last Thursday without turning control over to the lieutenant governor. His staff told people who asked that he was hiking on the Appalachian Trail.
“We also have to worry about whether this is the tip of the iceberg. We don’t know what else is out there. We don’t know what’s going to come out tomorrow. We don’t know what’s going to come out next,” said state Sen. Jake Knotts R-West Columbia.
The law enforcement agency said it was reviewing Knotts’ request, but hadn’t opened a criminal investigation involving Sanford as of Friday.
“To date, given the information we know, we do not believe that there will be a criminal investigation launched,” agency spokeswoman Jennifer Timmons said.
Also calling for inquiries were the state chapter of government watchdog Common Cause and the Washington-based nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, which directed its request to the state ethics commission.
Sanford got back to work Friday, meeting with his Cabinet in front of about two dozen reporters and cameramen. Routine business included a discussion of tax revenues and a drunken driving campaign, but Sanford’s first public meeting since returning from Argentina Wednesday was hardly ordinary.
Sanford apologized to the agency heads and at one point likened his struggle to that of King David. Sanford said King David “fell mightily, fell in very, very significant ways, but then picked up the pieces and built from there.”
Post-meeting, some Cabinet members said Sanford handled himself well.
“We all have things in our personal life that we don’t want to shine under the spotlight,” said Buck Limehouse, head of the state’s transportation department. “There’s nothing to be accomplished by rehashing this over and over. The needs of the people of South Carolina are more important than the personal issues.”
Not everyone in the capital is being as kind. Knotts encouraged other legislators to call for Sanford’s resignation and urged him to “do the right thing” and step down voluntarily.
Joining the calls for resignation was a one-time ally, the head of the group that’s pushed Sanford’s school choice effort. If Republicans are going to criticize Democrats for moral failings, Sanford has to go, said Randy Page, president of the conservative advocacy group South Carolinians for Responsible Government.
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June 28, 2009
AP NewsBreak: SC gov considered resigning, won’t
ABC News – Sanford’s Mistress Revealed
AP – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford pauses after apologizing to his state agency chiefs for keeping them …
By TAMARA LUSH, Associated Press Writer
SULLIVANS ISLAND, S.C. – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford considered resigning from office after his extramarital affair came to light, the Republican revealed Sunday in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press.
But Sanford, who hasn’t spoken publicly since Friday, said he spoke with close spiritual and political associates who advised him to fight to restore the public’s — and his family’s — trust in him.
“Resigning would be the easiest thing to do,” he said.
Sanford spoke outside his coastal home on Sullivans Island. Wearing frayed khaki shorts and a t-shirt, he talked about “walking into the legislative term with a humble spirit.”
“I have to go through that voyage over the next 18 months,” he said, alluding to the number of months he has left in his second term. He is barred by state law from seeking a third and, at one time, had been rumored as a potential presidential contender in 2012.
Now, Sanford says he wants to repair the frayed trust in him and continue to serve the people of South Carolina.
The governor admitted last week to a yearlong affair with a woman in Argentina. He and his wife say they will try to reconcile. Some lawmakers are calling for him to resign because he used public money to see the mistress during one trip, and because he was out of touch with his staff during his recent weeklong tryst.
Sanford repeatedly said he did not use public money for the trip, so it was not clear why he has agreed to reimburse the state for some of the more-than $8,000 in taxpayer money spent on the Argentina leg of an economic development trip to South America last year.
When it comes to his critics — most notably state Sen. Jake Knotts, R-West Columbia — and their calls for him to step down, Sanford said he understands where they are coming from.
“I don’t begrudge the Jakie Knottses of the world,” Sanford said. “He’s going to do what he’s going to do. I gotta do my part.”
As far as his wife, Sanford said they are working on their relationship.
“If there wasn’t healing going on, I wouldn’t be here,” he said, pointing to his beach house, where he had dinner with his family Saturday night and where he took a run at sunrise on the sand with one of his sons.
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June 28, 2009
Argentine woman admits
relationship with SC Gov.
AP
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – A 41-year-old Argentine woman has acknowledged having a relationship with South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford.
In a statement sent to news network C5n of Buenos Aires, Maria Belen Chapur says she will not talk about her private life.
But she says e-mail exchanges with Sanford that were widely published by U.S. media and elsewhere were obtained by someone who hacked her account.
She denies the hacker was a friend of hers.
Chapur says she suspects she knows who the hacker is but will not identify him, because she lacks proof and for legal reasons.
She says Sunday’s 200-word statement will be her only comment on the matter.
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June 27, 2009
Unlike SC’s Sanford, most governors easy to find
AP – FILE – This combination of file photos shows, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, … By RUSS BYNUM, Associated Press Writer
COLUMBIA, S.C. – Texas Gov. Rick Perry was raising money at campaign headquarters when an Associated Press reporter called his press staff to ask what he was doing. An hour later, he walked into AP’s statehouse bureau to show he was alive and well and not, say, in South America for a romantic rendezvous.
Most of the nation’s governors were willing — even eager — to prove they were on the job after revelations that South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford ditched his security detail and disappeared for a secret weeklong tryst with a mistress in Argentina.
The day after Sanford admitted his indiscretion at a tearful, rambling press conference, The Associated Press called governors’ offices nationwide to ask: What’s the boss doing right now?
Gov. Mike Beebe of Arkansas was at the dentist. Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley was fishing with his 10-year-old son. Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle was flying back from a Washington speaking engagement, while Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was visiting U.S. troops in eastern Europe.
Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman was in his office, but a few minutes after a reporter called he, too, showed up at the AP’s Capitol bureau — a state trooper, the lieutenant governor and his chief of staff in tow — to jokingly show he could be accounted for.
The AP had problems finding Georgia’s Sonny Perdue, who is serving his final term. His spokesman, Bert Brantley, said Perdue had worked at his Capitol office earlier, but he wasn’t sure where the governor was precisely when the AP called. When pressed, Brantley said he would not call the governor just to answer a press inquiry into his whereabouts.
“Even when he’s on a personal day or family time, he still keeps his Blackberry on him,” Brantley said. “There’s not a time when he’s not reachable.”
Sanford’s vanishing act had his fellow governors scratching their heads, if not cracking wise. Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer began a news conference Wednesday by joking he was late because he’d been in Venezuela.
“What was he thinking?” said Schweitzer, a Democrat. “Didn’t he think anyone would be watching?”
Impromptu checks by the AP showed most gubernatorial staffs keep close tabs on their bosses.
Florida Gov. Charlie Crist’s love life hasn’t been an obstacle to keeping in touch. Erin Isaac, Crist’s communications director, said: “I talked to the governor 100 times while he was on his honeymoon.” Crist just got married in December.
Generally, state officials and staffers should be able to locate a governor on a moment’s notice, and the public has a right to know too, said Gene Policinski, executive director of the First Amendment Center, a free speech education organization in Nashville, Tenn., that is part of the Freedom Forum.
Besides giving speeches, signing bills and attending ribbon-cuttings, governors must take charge in natural disasters. They command their states’ National Guards. And their personal time can become the public’s business, particularly when they betray people’s trust, Policinski said.
“As, unfortunately, recent scandals seem to indicate, there is legitimate public interest in knowing where a governor is and what they’re doing,” Policinski said.
When AP asked where governors were, the most common answer was in the office. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal was reviewing bills on the last day of the legislative session. Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry was interviewing a candidate for a judicial appointment.
Even when governors were traveling, staffers had little trouble saying exactly where they were. In Alabama, Gov. Bob Riley’s communications director, Jeff Emerson, knew Riley was landing in Seattle after an economic development trip overseas.
Palin’s spokeswoman, Sharon Leighow, said the Alaska governor was visiting National Guard troops from her state abroad, but wouldn’t immediately disclose where. She called back 30 minutes later, after getting the Defense Department’s OK, to say Palin was in Kosovo. Palin told the world where she was that same day in a Twitter update.
As Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty left a Republican fundraiser, he said he always tries to at least let his staff know what he’s doing.
“Regardless of whether you’re a governor or anyone else, having a little clear-your-head time is probably a good thing,” Pawlenty said. “But you always have to make sure you stay in touch in case there’s a problem. You have to communicate.”
While finding governors through their press offices is easy, tracking them down using schedules available to the general public can be trickier. Most release calendars of public events and news conferences, but some keep closed-door meetings and private functions under wraps even if they’re official state business.
Pawlenty’s staffers rejected a written request for access to his appointment calendar. On days when he doesn’t have news conferences or speeches, his daily events schedule often reads “No Public Events.” The fundraiser he attended wasn’t on it.
Many states cited security reasons for refusing to release schedules, while others said they’re not considered public records.
Most states were also tight-lipped about security, saying revealing details would put chief executives at risk, and arrangements varied widely in states willing to talk about them. In Virginia, State Police guard Gov. Tim Kaine around the clock, anywhere he goes, without exception. North Dakota Gov. John Hoeven, by contrast, normally drives his own car and state law doesn’t require him to have a security detail.
Sanford managed to slip overseas undetected because he dismissed his security detail before driving himself to the airport.
Reggie Lloyd, chief of the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division, told reporters his agency had no legal authority to refuse Sanford.
“As an adult male, he’s free to come and go as he pleases, and so we just honestly quit looking for him,” Lloyd said.
There was little need to ask Sanford’s office where he was after he returned Wednesday. His every move has been monitored and broadcast far beyond the borders of South Carolina.
On Friday, Sanford met with his agency chiefs to apologize for his baffling absence, then move on with any state business he may have neglected while he was AWOL in Argentina.
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June 28, 2009
Republicans eyed for 2012
weigh Sanford fallout
By DOUGLASS K. DANIEL, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON – A potential White House contender in 2012 staked a claim Sunday to rehabilitating the Republican Party in the wake of extramarital affairs by two leading Republicans that have damaged the GOP’s family-values image.
“Any time you have leading figures who are engaged in behavior that is sad and troubling and hypocritical, other people are going to look at that and say, ‘Hmm, they don’t walk the walk.’ And so the words and the actions don’t ring true,” said Gov. Tim Pawlenty, R-Minn. “It certainly hurts the brand.”
Pawlenty added: “I think I can make a contribution, in a positive way, for trying to rebuild this party. And it needs it.”
The latest disclosed dalliance, involving Gov. Mark Sanford, R-S.C., is sad and troubling, said Pawlenty, joined on the Sunday talks by two other possible presidential rivals who stepped carefully around the fallout.
Just talking about the Sanford matter is impolite, added Gov. Haley Barbour, R-Miss.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who ran for president in 2008, said the culture of the nation is hurt at such times.
Pawlenty and Barbour appeared to compare the sex scandals that apparently have sidelined Sanford and Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., from the group of 2012 hopefuls to Republican failure to stop runaway federal spending in recent years.
The link, they said, was hypocrisy.
“If you’re going to be, for example, the party of fiscal discipline and be the person talking who’s about fiscal responsibility, then you better do that,” said Pawlenty. “And so hypocrisy doesn’t sell, and the Republicans have to be true to their values, be true to their principles and walk the walk.”
Pawlenty, on the short list when Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., was considering a running mate in 2008, said the Sanford and Ensign scandals have damaged his party, although to what degree he didn’t know.
Ensign, like Sanford a social conservative who promoted family and religious values and criticized President Bill Clinton for his affair with an intern, admitted two weeks ago to an extramarital affair.
Barbour declined to discuss Sanford directly. “I just don’t talk about people’s personal problems. I don’t think it’s appropriate, I don’t think it’s polite, and I don’t think it achieves any purpose,” he said. Barbour said he doesn’t think the scandal will affect a single vote in this fall’s gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia.
“For us as Republicans, the biggest issue about this or about spending or about other policy issues is Republicans need to do what they say they’re going to do,” said Barbour, who took over leadership of the Republican Governors Association when Sanford resigned from that post. “I mean, that’s the issue. Are you going to do what you say you’re going to do?”
Romney agreed that everyone makes mistakes but asserted that people in public life ought to be held to a higher standard.
“Not all mistakes are the same. And not everybody is a governor or a senator or a president. And we expect people to live by a higher standard because what they do is going to be magnified. Their families are going to be hurt more by what they do,” Romney said. “The things they care about will be hurt. And the culture of the nation and the people who follow them will be hurt.”
Some Republicans won’t live up to the party’s values and its standards of ethical conduct, Romney said.
“That’s going to be true,” he said. “But not speaking about things that are important would be an enormous mistake.”
Romney said a second presidential run is “way beyond my horizon at this point” and that he is focusing on helping Republicans running for office this fall and in 2010.
As for his own presidential ambitions, Barbour said: “I’d be very surprised if I ended up running for president, but I can’t just say flatly no. But I would be very surprised. My wife would be even more surprised.”
Asked if he was running for president, Pawlenty said: “I don’t know what the future holds for me, but I do know this. I feel strongly about the values and principles for the Republican Party. I believe I have something to say about that.”
AP – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford listens to Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom during the budget and …
Pawlenty spoke Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” while Barbour appeared on CBS’ “Face the Nation” and Romney on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
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June 30, 2009
AP NewsBreak: SC gov admits additional liaisons
AP – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford listens to Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom during the budget and …
By TAMARA LUSH and EVAN BERLAND, Associated Press Writers
COLUMBIA, S.C. – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford is admitting more encounters with his Argentine mistress than he previously has disclosed.
In a lengthy, emotional interview with The Associated Press, the governor described seven meetings with the woman, including their first in 2001. Sanford says there have been five over a 12-month period, including two multi-night stays with her in New York.
It was the first disclosure of any get-togethers with her in the United States and contradicted a public confession last week during which he admitted to a total of four encounters in the past year.
He previously announced he would reimburse the state for money spent during a government trip to Brazil and Argentina in June 2008. But he insists no public money was used for any other meetings with her.
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June 30, 2009
AP Newsbreak: SC gov ‘crossed lines’ with women
WCNC Charlotte – Some upstate Republicans want Sanford to resign
AP – South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford ponders a question as he admits during an interview with The Associated …
By TAMARA LUSH and EVAN BERLAND, Associated Press Writers
COLUMBIA, S.C. – South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, already struggling to salvage his family and his political career after admission of a scandalous affair, added explosive details Tuesday, including more visits with the mistress he calls his “soul mate” and additional women in his past.
The once-promising presidential prospect said he is committed to reconciling with his wife, but professed to The Associated Press his continued love for the Argentine woman at the center of the firestorm that gutted his political future.
In emotional interviews with the AP over two days, he said he would die “knowing that I had met my soul mate.”
Sanford also said that he “crossed the lines” with a handful of other women during 20 years of marriage, but not as far as he did with his mistress.
“There were a handful of instances wherein I crossed the lines I shouldn’t have crossed as a married man, but never crossed the ultimate line,” he said.
Sanford insisted his relationship with Maria Belen Chapur, whom he met at an open air dance spot in Uruguay eight years ago, was more than just sex.
“This was a whole lot more than a simple affair, this was a love story,” Sanford said. “A forbidden one, a tragic one, but a love story at the end of the day.”
Even with the latest revelations, Sanford maintains he is fit to govern and has no plans to resign.
“I’ve been able to do my job and in fact excel at it,” Sanford said, while acknowledging he is a spectator at his “own political funeral.”
During more than three hours of interviews over two days at his Statehouse office, Sanford said he is trying to fall back in love with his wife, Jenny, even as he grapples with his deep feelings for Chapur.
“I owe it too much to my boys and to the last 20 years with Jenny to not try this larger walk of faith,” he said.
Sanford detailed more encounters with his mistress than he had disclosed during a rambling, emotional press conference last week. The new revelations Tuesday led the state attorney general to launch an investigation of Sanford’s travels, and some legislators to repeat calls for him to step down.
He delivered a personal check late Tuesday for nearly $3,000 to reimburse the state for a 2008 state-funded trip to Argentina where he visited Chapur, and he insists no public money was used for any other meetings with her.
House Speaker Bobby Harrell, who would chair any forced ouster of the governor by the Republican-controlled Legislature, said it’s premature to heed calls from those in his own party to remove Sanford.
“I want to see what the investigation finds before I’m willing to discuss that topic,” said Harrell, a Charleston Republican.
Sanford, at times crying and unabashedly emotional, acknowledged in the AP interview that he had casual encounters with other women while he was married but before he met Chapur. They took place during trips outside the country to “blow off steam” with male friends.
“What I would say is that I’ve never had sex with another woman. Have I done stupid? I have. You know you meet someone. You dance with them. You go to a place where you probably shouldn’t have gone,” Sanford said, declining to discuss details. But he said those encounters were nothing like his relationship with Chapur.
“If you’re a married guy at the end of the day you shouldn’t be dancing with somebody else. So anyway, without wandering into that field we’ll just say that I let my guard down in all senses of the word without ever crossing the line that I crossed with this situation.”
Sanford also detailed more visits with Chapur, including an encounter that he described as a failed attempt at a farewell meeting in New York this past winter, chaperoned by a spiritual adviser and sanctioned by his wife soon after she found out about the affair.
But he saw Chapur again, this time over Father’s Day weekend and after his wife expressly told him not to, leaving the country without telling his staff and instead leading them to believe he was hiking the Appalachian Trail.
By the time he returned to a puzzled public, staff and family, his public image and emotional state had unraveled. He admitted the affair at a news conference televised nationally, but at the time said there were only four meetings with his mistress.
Sanford told the AP he saw Chapur five times over the past year, including two romantic, multi-night stays with her in New York — one in Manhattan, one in the Hamptons, both paid for in cash so no one would know — before they met in the city again with the intention of breaking up.
He said he saw her two other times before that, including their first meeting.
“There was some kind of connection from the very beginning,” he said, though neither that first encounter nor a 2004 coffee date in New York during the Republican National Convention were romantic.
Their relationship turned physical, he said, during a government trip to Brazil and Argentina in June 2008, and when he returned, the e-mails that had started years earlier began to reflect anguish over what they had done.
“Now I am frightened,” he told the AP, describing his state of mind at the time. “It was before safe. But now it’s not safe. We gotta put the genie back in the bottle.”
Critics have charged that Sanford should resign or be impeached because he was unreachable during the latest Argentina trip and that no one was in charge of state government during his secret absence.
In the interview, he said he first became aware that officials were looking for him Monday evening, June 22 — four days after his departure for Argentina — when he checked his cell phone voice mail.
“I was reached ultimately on Monday evening,” he said. “I was contacted and called (chief of staff) Scott (English) back that Tuesday morning.” Sanford said he then changed his flight to return to South Carolina that evening.
He and Jenny, parents of four sons, say they are trying to reconcile their marriage but have not been sharing the same house for several weeks. Jenny Sanford found out about the relationship in January when she discovered a letter the governor had written to his mistress. She did not immediately return messages seeking comment Tuesday and was not at their coastal home on Sullivans Island.
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Associated Press writer Brett J. Blackledge contributed to this report.
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