According to Public Policy Polling, anyway. Granted, polling is especially tricky with a special election, because it’s difficult to really gauge what turnout is going to look like … but it’s kind of starting to look like, if any Republican could somehow possibly manage to lose this deeply crimson seat, Sanford could.
PPP’s newest poll on the special election in South Carolina finds Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch expanding her lead to 9 points over Mark Sanford at 50/41. Green Party candidate Eugene Platt polls at 3%.
Colbert Busch’s lead is on the rise for several reasons. She has a 51/35 advantage with independents. She’s winning over 19% of Republicans, while losing just 7% of Democrats. And it also seems that after last week’s revelations about Sanford that a lot of GOP voters are planning to just stay at home- while the district supported Mitt Romney by 18 points last fall, those planning to turn out for the special election voted for him by only a 5 point spread.
Sanford continues to be unpopular in the district with 38% of voters rating him favorably to 56% with a negative opinion. 51% say the revelations about his trespassing last week give them doubts about his fitness for public office. Interestingly the events of the last week haven’t hurt Sanford too much with Republicans though- 65% say the trespassing charges don’t give them any doubts about him, and his favorability with GOP voters has actually improved from 55/39 a month ago to now 61/32.
Yikes. This is all coming after the NRCC decided to jump ship and leave Sanford’s campaign to itself after last week’s revelations that he’s been caught violating his divorce agreement by trespassing at his wife’s home earlier this year, and big-name DC Republicans canceled a fundraiser they were planning to help out his campaign in the short space left before the May 7th election. And heck, with solid gold campaign tactics like this, who needs ’em, anyway?
Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford returns to the campaign trail next week and wants his Democratic congressional opponent, Elizabeth Colbert Busch, to join him. …
The campaign released a statement Friday saying Sanford plans to make 15 stops in five days next week in the Republican-leaning district on the state’s coast.
“To date, my opponent has refused to do any joint public appearances or debate the issues for the benefit of voters in the 1st District,” Sanford said. “Without debate on issues we are getting what President Obama and Nancy Pelosi gave us with ObamaCare – pass it and then you can see what’s in it. Now it’s vote for Colbert Busch and then see where she stands on the issues.”
The Colbert Busch campaign did not respond directly, but said that the candidate, the sister of comedian Stephen Colbert, has her own aggressive campaign schedule for the coming three weeks. She has scheduled a full day of events in Beaufort County today.
And then, there’s this. I just can’t summon anything to say about this.
Usually, it’s Texans who are notorious for invoking the Alamo amid tough circumstances.
But this weekend, former Gov. Mark Sanford referenced the epic battle in a full-page newspaper advertisement in the Sunday edition of Charleston’s The Post and Courier. …
So Sanford is invoking the Alamo in his struggle to return to Congress:
“In March of 1863, there was similarly little time. A South Carolinian by the name of William Travis drew a line in the sand with his sword and simply asked those who would stay and fight, to cross it. His efforts, and that of those who died with him there at the Alamo, 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 so important to sustaining it. …”
There’s a problem with this anecdote: the Alamo fell on March 6, 1836.
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