Tapper in 2009, South Carolina governor mark sanford was a republican rock star. His reputation as a budgetslashing deficit hawk family man had the gop betting on him to beat obama in 2012 until he became a missing person. The search for sanford threw his office into chaos and turned up a secret love affair and a bizarre set of lies that coined the phrase to hike the Appalachian Trail. But it also revealed something deeper how even the most tightly controlled political persona can mask the messy, imperfect reality of a human being. And counterintuitively, when the world was crashing down around him, baring it all might have been the savviest political move of Mark Sanfords career. Its monday night. Do you know where your governor is . Thats what the citizens of South Carolina are wondering Where In The World is our governor . A Mystery Tonight in South Carolina. The states governor, mark sanford, disappeared for days. Governor alert the search for mark sanford. In june 2009, South Carolina governor mark sanford became a missing person. News began to go out in South Carolina, get in the papers like, no one knows where the governor is. The South Carolina governor is missing. Where is he . Is he dead somewhere in a ditch . With each day that ticked by, the mystery grew. Reporter many in South Carolina dont know where he is, not even his wife. Reporter 2 its just so strange. This wellknown father of four young boys wasnt home for fathers day. Tapper and more and more people started asking. The headline in todays local paper says, sanford awol. Whos in charge . It was a complete dereliction of duty. Imagine if there was a mass shooting or a hurricane or, you know, anything. I think all of us are concerned. Were worried about where he might be. Speculation was rampant. Some people thought he was dead. A fringe few thought hed been abducted by aliens. It was only after hed be gone for nearly a week that sanford staff finally offered an explanation of where he was. His staff said he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. Tonight we find out this email coming through just a few minutes ago. The governors actually hiking the Appalachian Trail. The governor is said to be, clearing his head somewhere along the Appalachian Trail that stretches from georgia to maine. The governor is hiking the Appalachian Trail. Why would that be such a big secret . A reporter with the state newspaper had gotten a tip that mark sanford never went anywhere near the Appalachian Trail and goes nowhere near argentina, which is actually where he had been. What could compel a sitting governor to up and leave his state all the way to argentina without any kind of notice at all . The answer could only come from mark sanford himself. So the bottom line is this. I, um. Ive been unfaithful to my wife. I developed, um, a relationship with a dear, dear friend. Savage turned out he was a man in love. His cover is now blown. Mark sanford was not, after all, hiking by himself on the Appalachian Trail. Hiking the Appalachian Trail, which then instantly entered the lexicon as a euphemism for an affair. He was hiking on the Appalachian Trail, which is a trail that starts in maine and ends in an argentine womans vagina. [laughter and applause] it was all over the late night shows. It was every monologue. Hiking the Appalachian Trail. Where have you been, honey . Whats that lipstick . I was hiking the Appalachian Trail. It was just. It was such a huge contribution to the english language. So the guy had an affair and was really sloppy about covering it up. Hes hardly the first politician to do that. But there was something about this man dropping off the grid to see his secret International Lover that truly shocked people, myself included. Full disclosurei was friendly with mark and Jenny Sanford. I first met them more than 20 years ago when i was covering the South Carolina primary. My nowwife and i watched the super bowl at the Governors Mansion in 2004. Mark going awol, reading poetry and the bible while on a weeklong solo hike that, frankly, seemed totally believable. So when folks began speculating about seedy possibilities, i wrongly wrote it off as the worst kind of sensationalist journalism, and when it was proven true, i felt dumb. I felt duped for naively believing that i ever knew mark sanford the person, when i really only knew mark sanford the politician. And i wasnt the only one. Right there with me, caught between image and reality was sanfords closest aide his former chief of staff, scott english. Thank you so much for sitting down with us. You worked for mark sanford from 96 to 2015 . Is that yes. You know, i had my impression of him, which was that he was a nice, affable guy. Uh, he issued a proclamation for our wedding, which i do not have hanging up in my house anymore. But i mean, my point is i knew him and i liked him and jenny and marshall and bobo and blake, uh, and landon. Whatwhat did you think of him . You know, i love and respect this guy. I put in a lot of effort with this guy, okay . I missed a lot of my childrens life for this guy. Yeah. Which, by the way, is why ive never done an interview about this ever in my life. And. Until today. Right. But, you know, i could just never imagine him. Like, he had no game. I mean, he just didnt. And when someone threw out to me that maybe he had a mistress, i just laughed and said theres no way this guys got a mistress. You and i both thinking that he was actually on the Appalachian Trail is isis good. I mean, it made me feel better. Im like, yeah, that makes sense. Hes a weirdo. Maybe you think were being dramatic or exaggerating. How could we be so shocked at a politician having an affair . But you gotta understand. Mark sanford had one of the most convincing political personas in the game, and this was the guy we thought we knew. Time magazine named you one of the five most boring governors in america. [audience laughter] did that sting . What you learn in politics is theres gonna be some folks that dont like us, some folks that love us, and the real key is are we staying true to, you know, what we believe and whatwhatwhat, uh, we promised to voters in the first place. And then you can live with that and, uh, sort of leave it alone with the other 49 , cause you aint gonna please everybody. You are incredibly boring. [laughter] i was actually there when that was filmed, and heand it was like, yeah, youre boring. You are like manilaenvelope stapledtoabrownwall boring. Yeah. Yeah. Thats completely accurate, which is, again, why we were just, like, completely shocked that it was, like, this very, like, you know, passionate, emotional affair with this woman, you know, on the other side of the continent. It was just completely out of character or for what, like, we thought we knew about the guy. Heres the thing. I can accept that politics is a bit like professional wrestling. Candidates play a part to make headlines and win elections, but theres a fine line between marketing and outright deception. And Mark Sanfords scandal made me question is there any truth to a political persona, and whats the cost of keeping it up . So when you worked for him, you described him as saying, hes willing to say what he believes, act accordingly, and live with the consequences. But more recently, you have suggested that thats part of an image and a brand and not reality. So theres a duality to mark. One is the mark sanford that you meet, uh, in political life thats the brand guy. Thats thethe image that andand its not unique to mark. Its, you know, all all of these people have exactly the same thing. You know, it is about them. They are the brand. So you always had to be cognizant of the fact that you werent just working for an individual person, but you are working for this brand. What was his brand . His brand was focusing very much on limiting thethe size of government and balancing the budget. That wasfor him, that was his way of connecting with the audience. Reporter congressman mark sanford, republican of South Carolina, is the fresh face of this new breed. Ive actually got the remnants of last nights dinner here. [laughs] this is the new washington. This is not the 150 dinner that were accustomed to. I did save the crust. I mean, i didnt want anything to go to waste. The Fiscal Conservative thing with mark sanford was not an act. He was painfully fiscally conservative. For example, theres an infamous freakout there in the Congressional Office about him finding a discarded paper clip in the trash can, and he dug around in there and grabbed it back out and said, you can reuse this. Is he really making you save paper clips . Of course. [laughs] i remember Jenny Sanford in an interview complaining about he would not buy new suit jackets, and he would just wear the same clothes for years and years. He didnt just talk a big game about being frugal. He really was a frugal man. Tapper and while being frugal does not necessarily block a man from a little romance, mark inhabited this pennypinching, sweetly curmudgeonly character so thoroughly, i just could not imagine there were other aspects of him. You know, hes mark sanford, family man. Hes mark sanford, father of four boys. Right. Hes mark sanford, Fiscal Conservative. But thats the distinction between being the Character Actor and being the person. Theres Method Acting involved in politics, and theres a character they build thats real to them. But its not real. Its not real. Each one of these political figures theyre playing a character, and sooner or later, the fourth wall breaks. Reporter as a first step in reducing the 4. 7 trillion debt, Congressman Sanford is halting the delivery of ice to his Congressional Office. Why do we need ice . Why cant we just walk down three floors and get it from the Cafeteria Ourself . You cant just talk about it. I mean, you have to have actions in your own office that reflect that. English sanford, when he got elected, i could tell you exactly when i met him. We had a reception december 7, 1994. He had just been elected to the house . He had just been elected to the house. And we had a good conversation. The one thing that he and i share was a common philosophy about the world. You were just, like, taken with, like, he this could be a really good leader. You believed in him. Thati believed in the issues he believed in. Yeah. It really just, like, gets into my mind, like, it reallyi really didnt think mark was capable of doing anything slimy. Not mark. Yeah. Hes too afraid of jenny, and hes, you know, all of theseand hes they were, like, werent they, like, College Sweethearts . Theyd been together for 20 years. They had four beautiful kids. She was such an integral part of his professional and personal lives. They seemed great to me. That 20year journey together, you know, from congress to the Governors Office, when youre partnered with someone like that and youreyoure that relationships forged in steel, under fire. Theyre solid as a rock. You know that when you find a good one, you gotta help em, and you find a good one in mark sanford. But more importantly, the mom, Jenny Sanford, the great future first lady of the state of South Carolina. [applause] Jenny Sanford was invaluable to Mark Sanfords rise. She was a smart, skillful woman, a georgetowneducated, wall street vice president. I dont think that mark sanford, uh, would have had a political career at all if it were not for, uh, Jenny Sanfords help. Its not my love. Im not driven to run campaigns, but, um, but we worked well together. Jenny sanford had been a righthand woman throughout all of Mark Sanfords political career. She managed his congressional campaigns, and she also managed his First Campaign as governor something that she has said since she really tried to get out of doing because she had four sons, all of whom were still of school age, but, you know, she was free labor. [chuckles] and was somebody that he really wouldnt have toto hire on. On behalf of the people of the state, i wish you godspeed. Thank you. [cheers and applause] sure, mark and jenny made a great team, but it turned out there were some elements of the Sanford Union very few people knew about or even suspected. Right before we were getting married, when he said, you know, you know, theres your priest gives you a menu of different vows, and he says, well, you know, iiwith all due respect, id rather not use a vow that uses the word faithful in it, and i said, well, youve gotta be kidding me. And theres no question. I had my own thoughts about mark, but fidelity was the last thing i was worried about. But jenny brushed the red flags aside, and with her help, marks political brand grew until it seemed unstoppable. He entered the Governors Office as a sort of folk hero to South Carolina voters, a Saltine Cracker of a man on a singleminded crusade to save taxpayers money. When you have a 5 billion budget thats essentially A Billion Dollars out of out of balance, change is needed. But when he actually got to work at the state house, sanford found his passion for cutting budgets had also made him some enemies. Mark sanfordhes a republican. The legislature for years has been controlled by republicans, so theyre all in the same party, and ostensibly from the outside you would think, oh, okay. Well, these guys are all gonna get together and get a lot of things done. Thats not really what happened when mark sanford was in the Governors Mansion. Instead, mark sanford leaned further into character and started slashing his fellow republicans budgets with a vengeance. I mean, one year he vetoed the entire budget. I mean, just sent the entire budget back. We never got to a budget cycle where there werent dozens of budget vetoes. There was no democrat versus republican. It was, you know, us versus mark sanford, so he would send hundreds of vetoes back, and we would just get together and all override em, because it was mark. During one particularly volatile session in 2004, sanford kept vetoing budgets, and the legislature overrode 105 of those vetoes in 90 minutes. This is a republican legislature. A republican legislature. Uhhuh. And thatsi mean, thats how bad this was. And howd that go over . Uh. That morning, theres just, like, this Epic Freakout at the press office, and everybody is frantically on the phone dialing, and they look up, say, get on the phone and find some pigs. Im like, wwhat . Uh, get on the phone. Find pigs. Mark needs two pigs. Hes gonna take em upstairs and do a press conference. Im like, kay. And im just, like, googling, you know, where to find pigs, columbia, South Carolina. I, like, have no idea, right . They drove out to lexington county, which is a rural area outside columbia, and im still up on the house floor, working on legislation, trying to, you know, move the governors agenda to some other areas, and i can remember lots of people turning their heads and craning their heads and looking toward the lobby and then somebody said, oh, my god. He has pigs. When i was your age, we never had anything like this. What . Wifi . Wifi that works all over the house, even the basement. The basement. So i can finally throw that party. And invite shannon barnes. Dream do come true. Xfinity gives you reliable wifi with walltowall coverage on all your devices, even when everyone is online. Maybe well even get married one day. I wonder what i will be doing . Probably still living here with mom and dad. Fast reliable speeds right where you need them. Thats walltowall wifi on the xfinity 10g network. I assume you had tipped off the tv cameras and such. No. No . We didnt tell anybody. You didnt tell anyone. You just walked up with the pigs. No ones aware of what were doing, and we just start telling everyone in the lobby that the governors got pigs, so it just creates this mass of people, and all the reporters just go and set up. Voters across South Carolina tuned in as their manila envelope governor seemed to reveal the one issue that could stir him to reckless passion protesting his fellow republicans bloated porkfilled budget with actual pork. The constitution lost yesterday, and pork won. I think pork won, and the taxpayers lost. You know, mark had one under each arm and was maybe squeezing them a little too tight, and so there was a trail of Pig Excrement as he went up the stairs. He gets it down his pants and on his shoes and on his coat. Oh, boy. Which, for a guy who owns one coat. Yeah. The House Majority whip is yelling at me that we have to clean this mess up. Yeah. I went up there with the with the spray and the rags and a little bit of elbow grease, and, uh, cleaned up pig dookie that day.