Megachurch Pastor, Women's Group Blast Political Ambitions of Ex-Gov. Mark Sanford
A megachurch pastor and the head of the Concerned Women Political Action Committee, Penny Nance, have blasted disgraced Republican ex-governor of South Carolina Mark Sanford as a flawed choice to represent South Carolina's First Congressional District in Congress.
Voters are expected to go to the polls in a special election on May 7.
Sanford was forced to resign as governor of South Carolina when it was revealed that in the summer of 2009, he abandoned the state and his wife for a week to spend time with his Argentine mistress, Maria Belen Chapur, to whom he is now engaged.
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On Sunday, Mac Brunson, senior pastor of the Jacksonville, Fla., First Baptist Church warned that voters would be making a mistake if they sent him to Congress.
"Why do you think that a man who deals treacherously with his wife won't deal treacherously with you in business?" asked Brunson in a report in The Daily Caller. "See also: Mark Sanford, former governor of my home state, South Carolina, who told his wife, 'I'm going to the mountains to hike;' who told the people that work for him, 'I'm going to the mountains to hike;' who told the state of South Carolina who voted for him and put him in office, 'I'm going to the mountains to hike.' When they needed him and eventually caught up with him, they discovered he'd gone off to Argentina to have an affair," said Brunson.
"Now, the bright people of my home state have made him the GOP person for Congress … If he dealt treacherously with his wife before, and the state, and the people who worked for him, do you think [his] character has changed that much? That he's not gonna deal treacherously at some point in the future? That's a white man, GOP conservative — I'm an equal offender, brother. I don't care who it is. If it ain't right, it ain't right for nobody," added Brunson.
In a statement released by Penny Nance, president of Concerned Women Political Action Committee, she said South Carolina may have to consider a write-in candidate for the Congressional seat because both the Republican and Democratic candidates for the Congressional seat are flawed.
Former Rep. Tim Scott, vacated the seat after he was appointed to the Senate when former Sen. Jim DeMint resigned to become president of the conservative Heritage Foundation.
Sanford is currently locked in a fight for the seat with Democratic candidate Elizabeth Colbert Busch.
"We are considering a write-in campaign. It really depends on whether there is local support. I have been clear on where I stand," said Nance.
"Colbert Busch's view on same-sex marriage and abortion are out of sync with South Carolina's more conservative voters, and Sanford's candidacy is flawed, obviously. Character counts. And the people of South Carolina have no good options right now," said Nance who mused about perhaps recommending a write-on vote for Sanford's ex-wife Jenny.
In a USA Today report on Monday, Sanford who was recently abandoned by the National Republican Congressional Committee said his campaign was under siege and likened himself to William Travis at the Alamo in ad published in a Charleston newspaper.
"…Ultimately inspired Texans to come to the aid of their brethren and defeat Santa Anna's army though they were outnumbered at the onset by six to one. I'm outnumbered right now, but will fight to the end toward freedom and financial sanity in Washington to sustaining it," noted Sanford in the ad.
In a response to Sanford's claims in the report, however, a spokeswoman for South Carolina's Democratic Party, Kristin Sosanie, noted on Monday: "Only in Mark Sanford's narcissistic world would this rough week be all about him and not the people of Boston or Texas … As we've seen again and again, the people of South Carolina just can't trust him to stand up for our values."
