South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford says he's not quitting — even though he considered it — despite intense scrutiny and criticism over his admitted affair with a woman from Argentina. That woman, 41-year-old former television reporter Maria Belen Chapur, acknowledged Sunday that she had a relationship with Sanford and that the matter has been “very painful to me, my two children, my entire family and close friends.” In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, Sanford said thought about stepping down and away from the public eye to rebuild his life. That was until close spiritual and political associates urged him to instead fight to restore people's trust and finish out the 18 months left in his term. “Resigning would be the easiest thing to do,” he said Sunday. Chapur, a divorced mother of two sons, said in a statement to news network C5n of Buenos Aires that e-mails from her relationship with Stanford were leaked to a South Carolina newspaper after someone accessed her Hotmail account without permission late last year. As far as his marriage, Sanford said he and his wife are working on it.
