CHARLESTON, S.C. — South Carolina’s first lady says her wedding was a “leap of faith” because Gov. Mark Sanford, who famously cheated on her with a woman he described as his soul mate, did not want to include a vow of fidelity in their marriage ceremony.
Jenny Sanford also tells ABC’s Barbara Walters in an interview airing Friday on “2 0/20” that the final blow to the marriage was the publication of racy e-mails between the Republican governor and his Argentine mistress. Her memoir, “Staying True,” will be out Friday as well.
Not having a vow of faithfulness “bothered me to some extent, but . . . we were very young, we were in love,” Jenny Sanford tells Walters. “I questioned it, but I got past it.”
In her memoir, Sanford writes that her groom was worried “in some nagging way” that he might not be able to remain true.
“With the benefit of the knowledge I have about Mark now, I could point to this moment as a clear sign of things to come,” she writes. But at the time, she found his honesty “brave and sweet” and thought he just had cold feet.
Jenny Sanford has filed for a divorce that is to be finalized later this month. Last summer she moved out of the governor’s mansion and now lives with the couple’s four sons at the family’s beachfront home on Sullivans Island.
