Rep. Mark Sanford: Trumpism Is a 'Cancerous Growth' in the Republican Party

Congressman Mark Sanford is beginning to cry. We're only a few minutes into our conversation before the South Carolina congressman chokes up. "I apologize," he says, wiping his eyes. "I just can't go certain places or you hit the wrong nerve."

It's Thursday afternoon, less than 48 hours after Sanford's shocking loss to a Republican primary challenger. It was the first and only electoral loss of a career that began with his election to Congress in 1994 and continued with eight years as South Carolina governor, punctuated by the now-infamous "hiking the Appalachian Trail" cover story for an extramarital affair he had with a woman in Argentina while in office. In 2013, Sanford bounced back, surprising those who believed his political career was finished by once again winning a seat in Congress.

Recently, Sanford, 58, stood out as one of the few Republicans in the House or Senate to publicly rebuke Donald Trump. Sanford called on Trump to release his tax returns. He criticized Trump for his lack of humility and willingness to mislead the public. He said Trump "has fanned the flames of intolerance." For these and other perceived sins, Trump attacked Sanford on Election Day with a tweet endorsing his opponent and accusing Sanford of being "very unhelpful to me in my campaign to MAGA" and "nothing but trouble." Sanford lost by 3,000 votes to Kate Arrington, a state lawmaker who declared in her victory speech, "We are the party of President Donald J. Trump."

Link to tweet

Sanford is hardly a centrist Never-Trumper – by one calculation, he claims, he's voted with Trump 89 percent of the time. But Trumpism demands more than voting with the president, Sanford tells Rolling Stone in his first extended interview since the loss. "It's clearly not about issues," he says. "It's about allegiance to him."

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/mark-sanford-trump-cancerous-growth-republican-party-w521590?utm_source=rsnewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=daily&utm_campaign=061518_15

Sorry Sanford but this shit's been a long time coming. Trump just turned the GOP dog whistle into a foghorn.