Sunday, Jul. 05, 2009

Sanford’s affair: How to mismanage a crisis

Sanford made ‘classic mistakes’ in handling scandal, political observers say

There is a politician’s playbook for coping with an extramarital affair that explodes into scandal.

But Mark Sanford did not operate from that playbook. Instead, the embattled S.C. governor took a different course — to disastrous effect, those who have managed communications for politicians said last week.

“He’s made a lot of the classic mistakes you make in a crisis,” said Shell Suber, the former political director for U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham’s re-election campaign who now works as a Columbia-based strategist with the Felkel Group. “He’s perpetuating the story. Every time he talks, he offers more detail and more contradictory detail.”

And that was just Tuesday.

Political strategists say Sanford has done just about everything wrong in his attempt to manage the fallout from his affair with a woman in Argentina.

He lied about it. He tried to cover it up. Then, he admitted it — parts of it, anyway. And then he offered up sensational details, some of which contradicted sensational details he had offered before.

“About as bad as you can do,” said Phil Noble, a former political strategist who is now president of S.C. New Democrats, a reform group started by former Gov. Dick Riley.

Until recently, Sanford was adept at managing the issues that come a politician’s way.

He was elected to Congress three times and twice elected governor. More recently, Sanford had been touted as a possible Republican presidential candidate in 2012.

Until recently, Sanford’s most trusted adviser has been his wife, Jenny Sanford.

But Jenny Sanford made it clear in the early days of this scandal that the governor’s political career was no longer her concern.

In fact, it was her answers to questions about his whereabouts that helped convince curious reporters that something was amiss.

THE SCRIPT

There is a script for such matters, and political strategists say Sanford did not have to stick to it though it is often followed in such scandals.

First, the politician reads from a prepared statement expressing sorrow to the betrayed wife, usually at the politician’s side, and for letting down supporters.

That script also calls for a swift but brief exit from the public stage, followed by a well-managed re-entry for votes or other official duties, which shows the public that the wayward politician is back on the job.

“The public does not buy that,” said Carol Dahmen, a political strategist who worked for former California Gov. Gray Davis.

Sanford — ever the maverick loner — chose his own damage-control script. That’s OK, the experts say.

In moving beyond that now-tired, standard response, Dahmen and other strategists said the governor should have:

• Admitted the affair to staff and the public. Sanford did, but then kept adding and changing details.

• Offered an unequivocal apology. Sanford did, but to his lover before his wife. Jarringly, he then continued to refer to his lover as his “soul mate.”

• Made whatever restitution was necessary without prompting. Sanford did, after prompting.

• Got back to work.

Dahmen, however, said it’s hard to get some politicians — whose outsized egos and enhanced opinion of themselves help get them elected — to heed the advice of others in the midst of scandal.

“They almost don’t believe it’s happened to them,” she said. “You have to swallow your pride, and I haven’t really seen that.”

Dahmen has had her own trials by fire in helping politicians through scandal.

She advised the sons of then-U.S. Rep. Gary Condit, the California Republican whose affair with a young intern — Chandra Levy — embroiled him in a murder investigation and eventually short-circuited his political career.

Dahmen was also communications director for Kevin Shelley, who was secretary of state in California before resigning in 2005 in the midst of sexual-harassment and campaign-financing scandals.

As those scandals swirled, Dahmen said it was hard to reach Shelley for strategy sessions. He hunkered down at his home.

“I looked him in the eye and said, “You need to own up to this,’” she said.

CALL A HUDDLE

Suber said staffers have a hard time suggesting painful paths to their boss.

“Your normal advisers around, they’re probably not the most equipped people to help you with this,” he said. “It’s best to seek someone from outside, even if you don’t know them that well. The staff, they’re also hurt. And that may color what they do.”

Some allies have suggested the governor could use the help. However, the governor’s spokesman, Joel Sawyer, said the governor has not hired anyone to help him manage his response to the scandal.

Jeri Cabot, an adjunct professor of political science at the College of Charleston, said it was clear from the start that Sanford was not handling the scandal well.

“He’s not prepared himself well,” Cabot said. “What goes into preparation? Have a sense of the questions and what the answers are. Having a consistent tone — not necessarily a confident one.”

Cabot said the governor’s 18-minute confession on June 24 to the affair was poorly managed right down to the detail of staging it in an area where young people were standing behind him, smirking.

But the expansive interview with The Associated Press Monday and Tuesday was perhaps most damaging of all, Cabot said.

“You would think that his staff would have called for a huddle and said, ‘If you’re going to go out there, this is what you need to say.’”

In that interview, Sanford acknowledged he had met with his mistress more often than he had previously disclosed, called her his soul mate, said he will try to fall in love again with his wife and said he “crossed the lines” with other women — but not “the ultimate line.”

Based on the reaction of those who posted comments on The State’s Web site after reading that story, readers were revolted.

‘THE LESS HE SAYS, THE BETTER’

If Sanford is to continue in office, political strategists said, he needs to learn discipline, take on a manageable issue and get back to work.

Over the July 4 holiday weekend, Sanford is on vacation in Florida with his family. He has not made any more public comments since Tuesday. His wife, Jenny, issued a statement Thursday, saying the door is open to forgive her husband.

That works in Sanford’s favor. By Monday, the governor is expected to be back to work.

“Right now,” Dahmen said, “the less he says, the better.”

Reach senior writer Wayne Washington at (803) 771-8385.

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