Wife discovered affair from letter; Gov. asked to see mistress

Jenny Sanford discovered her husband’s affair after stumbling across a letter he had written to his mistress, the first lady said in an AP interview on Friday.

She was “shocked and obviously deeply hurt. I didn’t think he had it in him,” Mrs. Sanford said. “It’s hard to find out your husband is not who you thought he was.”

Jenny Sanford also said her husband asked permission to visit his mistress in the months after the affair came to light.

“I said absolutely not. It’s one thing to forgive adultery; it’s another thing to condone it,” Sanford said.

And regarding the Governor’s strange disappearance:

“He was told in no uncertain terms not to see her,” Jenny Sanford said in a strong, steady voice as she sat in her oceanfront living room Friday. “I was hoping he was on the Appalachian Trail. But I was not worried about his safety. I was hoping he was doing some real soul searching somewhere and devastated to find out it was Argentina. It’s tragic.”

Read the whole thing here.