By Jessica Holdman
SCDailyGazette.com
Former Gov. Mark Sanford said he is “stepping aside” in the race for South Carolina’s coastal 1st District, but he’ll still be on GOP primary ballots.
The end of Sanford’s campaign comes less than a month after he launched a bid to win back the congressional seat he lost eight years ago.
The two-term GOP governor said he instead intends to form a non-profit organization advocating for reduction of the nation’s debt.
According to his latest campaign filing, he has about $1.5 million in his account — largely left over from his previous campaigns — that he could put into a nonprofit. Sending money to a charity is among the allowed uses of excess campaign cash.
“After a lot of thought, I’ve concluded that the most effective way I can contribute right now is not by seeking office, but by helping build a broader movement focused on the country’s financial future,” Sanford said in a statement. “The trajectory of debt and deficits isn’t a Republican problem or a Democrat problem — it’s an American problem. And it’s one that demands sustained grassroots pressure for change to occur.”
When seeking his third stint in Congress, Sanford turned in his paperwork with less than two hours remaining in the two-week filing period. To officially withdraw, he must again submit paperwork to the state Election Commission.
Because the state has already printed its 2026 primary ballots, Sanford’s name will still appear alongside the 10 other Republicans vying for the chance to replace U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, who is running for governor.
Seven Democrats are also competing for their party’s nomination.
Sanford lost his 2018 bid for re-election to then-state Rep. Katie Arrington of Charleston, who had President Donald Trump’s endorsement. But she lost that November to Democrat Joe Cunningham as the 1st District flipped for a single term before Mace’s 2020 win.
It is unknown whether Trump would have weighed in again, but Sanford did tell The Post and Courier the president “has a very long memory toward people who haven’t kissed the ring.”
Sanford, a long-time Trump critic, said the possibility of the president endorsing another candidate did not factor into his decision.
“But I’ve always been aware of that contingent liability — and it’s real,” he told the Post and Courier.
Governor from 2003 to 2011, Sanford’s second tenure in Congress began with a 2013 special election. He won a 16-way Republican primary to fill the vacancy created when then-Gov. Nikki Haley appointed Tim Scott to the U.S. Senate.
It was a remarkable political comeback just two years after Sanford left the Governor’s Mansion following a scandalous affair with a woman in Argentina.
Sanford had planned to lean on his reputation as a staunch fiscal conservative in his latest bid to return to Washington.
The mounting deficit, which has only grown since his first election to Congress in 1994, was part of Sanford’s platform in 2019, during his short-lived presidential campaign.
“Our nation’s crumbling financial course is what led me to enter this race, and it’s what’s animated my time in politics,” he said in a statement.
Now it will be the focus of his soon-to-be named nonpartisan 501(c)(3) organization.
Similarly, U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint used his leftover campaign cash to start South Carolina’s Palmetto Promise Institute after he resigned in December 2012 to take the helm of the conservative Heritage Foundation. Scott replaced DeMint, who was ousted from the Washington think tank in 2017.
Jessica Holdman writes about the economy, workforce and higher education. Before joining the SC Daily Gazette, she was a business reporter for The Post and Courier. The S.C. Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
