Nearly $45,000 spent by news shows on Sanford interviews

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Gov. Mark Sanford started the year wanting to cut $724,000 from the budget of South Carolina’s public television network.

Instead, the stimulus-fighting governor became the station’s cash cow as national cable and network news shows paid nearly $45,000 to conduct interviews with him at ETV studios and use ETV’s satellite link.
   
Documents from the agency show 46 appearances using ETV’s satellite operations since November. Thirty-one of those were on Fox News shows.

Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer says the governor was an invited guest. The appearances have raised Sanford’s national political profile. But Sawyer says they were all about policy.