Final Round Set for Parties in South Carolina House Race

María Belén Chapur’s appearance was a surprise, especially to leaders in the national Republican Party. It might not have been the most strategic move in Mr. Sanford’s attempt at a political comeback. Still, it was how Mr. Sanford wanted it.

Whether national Republican leaders will decide that the former governor is putting the seat in jeopardy and decide to lend more support is only one question in a race that has already been filled with political and personal drama. After defeating 15 other candidates in a primary race and winning a runoff on Tuesday, Mr. Sanford faces Elizabeth Colbert Busch, a Democrat with enough celebrity appeal and financial backing to change what could have been an easy victory in the special election on May 7 into a real battle.

“Everybody is really concerned because she’s not a bad-looking lady, she is a good speaker and she’s got some money,” said Jerry Hallman, chairman of the Beaufort County Republican Party. “In politics, those things are important.”

The seat became vacant after Senator Jim DeMint announced in December that he was stepping down to take over the Heritage Foundation. Gov. Nikki R. Haley appointed Representative Tim Scott to replace him, opening up the Congressional seat that Mr. Sanford held before he became governor.

Gender, fidelity and experience are already shaping up as themes in the district, which includes Charleston, Hilton Head and some Low Country farmland. Mr. Sanford began his campaign as a kind of apology tour, explaining he had learned much about humility after leaving the governor’s office in 2011, having lied about a trip to Argentina to visit Ms. Chapur. Mr. Sanford said he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. Although he finished his term, he faced ethics fines, censure by his party and divorce from his wife of 21 years, Jenny.

Now, he has gone on the offensive, portraying himself as a seasoned fiscal hawk in a race against a political neophyte whose most notable credential is her celebrity family. Ms. Colbert Busch’s younger brother is the comedian Stephen Colbert, who has been active in her campaign.

Already the national Republican Party, though not committing to using heavy artillery in the race, is painting Ms. Colbert Busch as too liberal for a district that voted for Mitt Romney in the presidential primary. (Newt Gingrich won the state over all.)

“So far, Elizabeth Colbert Busch has yet to answer any real questions about why she supports President Obama’s failed policies,” said Katie Prill, a spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee. “She might be the gem of the Beltway and Hollywood liberals, but South Carolinians are going to be sorely disappointed the more they learn about her.”

Ms. Colbert Busch is leaning on her years as a maritime executive and at Clemson University, where she is leading an effort to develop the state’s wind power industry. She is also relying on several women in Congress, among them Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand, the New York Democrat, who began using Twitter to seek donations to the campaign.

Democratic leaders realize the race must be run without error, with special attention paid to women and moderate Republicans who remember Mr. Sanford’s rocky relationship with the Legislature when he was in office and, of course, his affair.

But the national organization probably won’t make a move until the other side does.

“This is a Republican seat in a Republican district, so we’ll wait and see what the Republicans do,” said Jesse Ferguson of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Hesaid national Republican organization might not be eager to get involved.

“Having Mark Sanford as the face of the party is probably not the best thing for a party trying to rehabilitate itself with women voters,” he said.

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Column: Artur Davis shows hypocrisy in switching parties

Every time the political pendulum makes a big shift, there are politicians who go over to the other side.

AP

Davis: Ex-congressman of Alabama.

AP

Davis: Ex-congressman of Alabama.

DeWayne Wickham USATODAY columnist

Back in the 1960s, after President Johnson signed a series of civil rights laws into effect that ended the Jim Crow era, a legion of Southern Democrats switched to the Republican Party. When the 2008 election gave Democrats control of the White House and veto-proof majorities in both houses of Congress, then-Sen. Arlen Specter, a moderate Pennsylvania Republican, returned to the Democratic Party that he had deserted in 1966.

So, it came as no surprise to me when Artur Davis, a former Democratic congressman from Alabama, announced that he was switching to the GOP. His decision comes as Republicans enjoy a sizable majority in the House and threaten to seize control of the Senate and the Oval Office in November.

Davis' stroll over to the GOP side was a pretty short trip, given the position he has occupied along this nation's ideological spectrum. He was a right-of-center Democrat who, for example, voted against the Affordable Care Act, which the Supreme Court upheld last Thursday.

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Failed race for governor

In his 2010 bid to become Alabama's first black governor, Davis refused to openly court the state's top African-American political organizations and ended up losing the Democratic primary in a landslide to Ron Sparks, the state's agriculture secretary. Sparks, who is white, even won the overwhelmingly black 7th congressional district that Davis represented at the time.

So when Davis — who attended Harvard Law School with Barack Obama and seconded his nomination at the 2008 Democratic convention — announced that he was cutting his ties to the Democratic Party, it was not a surprising move for someone who had rolled the political dice — and lost badly.

But the thing that distinguishes Davis from so many others who have changed party labels is the level of his hypocrisy.

Criticized a colleague

Back in 2009, when Rep. Parker Griffith, D-Ala., defected to the Republican Party, Davis could hardly contain his contempt for his old colleague.

"He leaves a party where differences of opinion are tolerated and respected to join a party that in Washington, marches in lockstep, demands the most rigid unity, and articulates no governing philosophy beyond the forceful use of the word 'no,' " Davis said.

Instead of bolting, Davis said, Griffith should have remained in the Democratic Party, just as Sen. Howell Heflin and Rep. Bud Cramer, two of Alabama's more prominent conservative Democrats, had done. (Heflin retired in 1997, and Cramer stepped down in 2009.)

At the time, Davis said those two Democrats understood that "fiscal conservatism, robust advocacy for our fighting forces, and a defense of our best national values are not partisan principles."

But now, after the folly of his gubernatorial campaign, Davis sees a different political landscape. "Wearing a Democratic label no longer matches what I know about my country and its possibilities," he said.

Davis talks of resurrecting his political career by moving to Virginia and possibly running as a Republican for the state senate, or competing for one of the Old Dominion's seats in the House.

"If that sounds imprecise, it's a function of how uncertain political opportunities can be," he wrote in a May blog posting.

What it sounds like to me is the double talk of a man who's trying to convince himself that he has made the right decision.

DeWayne Wickham writes on Tuesdays for USA TODAY.

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Both parties reaching out for Hispanics

In the partisan general election environment, the importance of the Hispanic electorate is one rare area of agreement between the two parties.

By Michael Francis McElroy, Getty Images

President Obama speaks about job training at Lorain County Community College on Wednesday in Elyria, Ohio.

By Michael Francis McElroy, Getty Images

President Obama speaks about job training at Lorain County Community College on Wednesday in Elyria, Ohio.

The Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Obama campaign launched dueling outreach programs this week to court this growing bloc of voters — a pitch to Latino voters that's likely to continue throughout the 2012 cycle.

The two camps are focusing on different issues to appeal to Latinos. The Obama campaign is emphasizing the work the administration has done to expand educational programs and health care access. Republicans' pitch will focus on the economy and promises they say were broken by the Obama administration.

Republicans are behind.

A poll released by the Pew Research Center on Tuesday shows Obama beating former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney 67% to 27% among Hispanic voters. In 2008, Obama defeated Sen. John McCain 67% to 31% among Hispanics.

During a conference call with reporters Wednesday, Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., criticized Republicans for blocking the DREAM Act, a measure that would allow children of illegal immigrants to earn citizenship through a college education or service in the military.

Obama campaign spokesman Jim Messina said during the same call, "Our victory depends on them (Hispanics) spreading the word to their friends, their neighbors and their families about what's at stake in this crucial election."

In a news release, the campaign called its outreach "the largest ever national effort to engage Hispanic Americans in their communities and involve them in the upcoming election through voter registration, volunteering and voting."

Messina said the effort will build upon a network of volunteers that has been in place for more than a year.

The Obama campaign released the first in a series of Spanish-language television and radio ads featuring tributes to Obama in Colorado, Florida and Nevada.

The RNC announced Monday that it is placing Hispanic outreach directors in six states: Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina and Virginia.

Republicans are emphasizing the economy and the impact the downturn has had on Latinos.

Bettina Inclán, the RNC's director of Hispanic outreach, said that in past years, the RNC had relied on coalitions, which, though helpful, did not provide the support needed to cultivate voter loyalty.

"We wanted to figure out how to bring the best of the coalitions and the best of the (get-out-the-vote) political operation and merge them into an effective Hispanic outreach program that not only respects the diversity of the Hispanic community but … (yields) real results," she said.

Cesar Martinez, a former aide to Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign, said the RNC is taking the right approach by focusing on jobs because Latinos were hit hard by the recession. but he said immigration will be a hurdle if Republicans don't present a solution.

"The Republican Party needs to have an immigration proposal in hand, because if they don't, Obama can just keep on promising and not delivering," Martinez said. "This status quo only helps Obama."

Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, which supports immigration, said voters will pick the candidate who will get meaningful things done for the community, such as focusing on deporting only people who commit serious crimes.

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