By Molly Parker
mparker@scbiznews.com 
Published Nov. 20, 2009

Gov. Mark Sanford said this morning that he was not surprised by the S.C. State Ethics Commission’s announcement earlier this week that it was moving forward with a hearing on whether Sanford broke any laws in his airline travel.

“We knew there would be probable cause,” Sanford said this morning as politicians gathered to break ground on Boeing’s Dreamliner assembly plant in North Charleston.

The ethics commission met on Wednesday and said afterward that it had found enough evidence to proceed with the hearing.

The commission privately gave the governor a copy of a report on its investigation into those matters, according to a statement released by House Speaker Bobby Harrell.

Harrell, R-Charleston, said the report is a public document and criticized the governor for withholding it from the public.

Sanford said that document would be made public on Monday by the Ethics Commission. The governor also said the matter was handed over to his lawyer and that he doesn’t “try to keep up with all the different wrinkles in this.”

“Boeing is the thing we talk about today; on Monday, we’ll deal with the other,” Sanford said, attempting to sidestep questions about the investigation and keep the focus on Boeing.

The question of whether the State Ethics Commission’s report would be made public was the subject of a legal dispute that went before the S.C. Supreme Court last month. The court ruled that the report should be public because Sanford waived his right to confidentiality in a letter he sent to the State Ethics Commission in August.

The governor’s office had argued that release of the report would be premature and would not reflect his side of the issue.

“We are disappointed that Gov. Sanford has broken his transparency promise by keeping this court-ordered public document secret,” Harrell said in the statement he sent out yesterday.

Harrell’s statement also was critical of the Ethics Commission.

“The nine-member Ethics Commission had the opportunity to publicly release this investigation during their closed-door meeting yesterday,” he said. “Instead, the commission chose to privately give the governor this public document.”

The executive director of the State Ethics Commission and Sanford’s attorney in the case did not return calls made on Thursday by the Charleston Regional Business Journal’s about the matter.

“Gov. Sanford should release this public document to the citizens of South Carolina so that we can see the facts behind these allegations made against our state’s highest elected official,” Harrell’s statement said. “Only then can we know the truth, quickly address the concerns it raises and move on so we can work on the issues South Carolinians care about the most.”

House Rep. Greg Delleney, R-Chester, along with three co-sponsors, filed a bill to impeach Sanford earlier this week

House members supporting impeachment have cited the governor’s abandonment of his duties during a five-day absence this summer and allegations raised by media that the governor has been abusing state rules on air travel and spending. The investigation was launched after Sanford went missing for several days. Without telling anyone, he flew to Argentina to meet a mistress he had been having an affair with and admitted to the affair in a nationally televised press conference.

Harrell has said lawmakers should wait for the State Ethics Commission’s report before proceeding with impeachment.

“Unless the investigation contains new information about serious crimes or serious misconduct by the governor, in my opinion, the information we have to date does not rise to a level to remove him from office,” Harrell said earlier this week. “The Ethics Commission’s investigation will be used as the basis to determine whether or not the governor’s actions rise to that level.”

Ashley Fletcher Frampton contributed to this report.