Once a governor, congressman, and presidential hopeful, Mark Sanford is eyeing a return to the political stage.

The seasoned politician from South Carolina has submitted the necessary paperwork to vie for the First Congressional District seat near Charleston, a position he previously held.

The current seat holder, Congresswoman Nancy Mace, is running for governor and has opted not to seek re-election to Congress this year.

Sanford’s extensive political career includes time in Congress, followed by a gubernatorial stint in South Carolina, where he even gained a reputation as a potential presidential candidate.

However, his promising career took a hit in 2009 after news of an extramarital affair became public, yet he managed to complete his term as governor.

Sanford made a comeback by reclaiming a congressional seat, though he lost it in 2018. His attempt to challenge then-President Trump in the 2019 presidential primaries fell short, putting a pause on his political revival.

Outside of his well-known cheating scandal, he has also reportedly slept with disgraced journalist Olivia Nuzzi.

Ryan Lizza, a former Politico journalist and Nuzzi’s ex-fiance, claimed she was ‘sleeping with’ former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford years before her ‘digital affair’ with Robert F Kennedy Jr. 

Nuzzi attempted to ease back into public life last fall to promote her tell-all book, American Canto, a year after her emotional dalliance with Trump’s health secretary.

Mark Sanford speaks during a news conference in front of the Statehouse, November 12, 2019, in Concord, New Hampshire

Olivia Nuzzi attends the 2023 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner at Washington Hilton on April 29, 2023 in Washington, DC

But her promotion tour took a turn when Lizza shared a scathing Substack post alleging she cheated on him.

Lizza claimed in a piece titled ‘Part 1: How I Found Out’, published on his outlet Telos News, that he found a love note Nuzzi had allegedly written ‘a famous politician, 32 years older than Olivia, and well-known for a sex scandal.’

However, the famous politician was not RFK Jr – and was allegedly Sanford, whom Nuzzi had profiled for New York Magazine when he launched his long-shot 2020 presidential bid.

‘If I swallowed every drop of water from the tower above your house, I would still thirst for you,’ she allegedly wrote to Sanford in a lurid passage Lizza shared.

Describing his on-off relationship with Nuzzi as ‘turbulent’, Lizza said he and Nuzzi fell in love when he extricated her from a ‘strings attached’ partnership with former MSNBC anchor Keith Olbermann, 66.

Lizza recalled discovering the note she had written to Sanford after it had scattered from her backpack.

After looking through further pages, Lizza said: ‘My heart stopped when I realized who he was.’

Lizza, a former Washington correspondent for Politico, describes feeling devastated over ‘Olivia’s betrayal’ and worried that it would ruin a book the pair were writing together about the 2020 presidential campaign.

He wrote that Nuzzi told him she became ‘infatuated’ with Sanford after covering him for New York Magazine, eventually sending him ‘increasingly risqué pictures and texts’ and even ‘secretly followed him on the campaign trail.’

He then alleges that Nuzzi and Sanford ‘consummated’ their relationship at the ex-governor’s home ‘one night after she went dark on me and made up a story about how she was dealing with a crisis concerning her sick mother.’

Lizza concluded his bombshell post by revealing he called his agent: ‘We have a big problem. Olivia is sleeping with Mark Sanford.’

Sanford’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Mail.

Sanford is a last-minute entrant into the primary field to replace Mace, which currently includes at least eight other Republicans per Ballotpedia. Representative Mark Smith is the only state-level legislator in the race. County council members Jay Byars, Logan Cunningham, and Jenny Costa Honeycutt are also in the mix.

The primary is June 9th, with a runoff planned for two weeks later on June 23rd.