The National Republican Campaign Committee may have halted its support of embattled congressional candidate Mark Sanford, but that isn’t stopping its Democratic counterpart from going on the attack.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee released a vicious new attack ad Thursday, accusing the South Carolina Republican of walking out on his constituents just as he walked out on his ex-wife.
“Mark Sanford walked out on us, violated our trust,” the ad’s narrator says over soft-focus images of a man walking down a wooded path. The spot then pivots to Sanford’s ethics troubles, noting that Sanford “secretly used thousands of taxpayer dollars flying to Argentina and then lied about it,” and that “Sanford paid the largest ethics fine in state history.”
“Now he wants our trust again? Maybe Mark Sanford should just keep walking,” the ad concludes.
The language and the Appalachian Trail-like imagery is clearly designed to remind voters of Sanford’s infamous 2009 disappearance and extramarital affair. Sanford, of course, made the Democrats’ task much easier by repeatedly trespassing on his ex-wife’s property, in violation of their divorce settlement — a fact that was revealed on Tuesday.
According to National Journal, the DCCC is spending more than $188,000 to run the ad in the Charleston, SC and Savannah, GA markets from April 19 through April 28.
