With no delusions about his chances, Mark Sanford is challenging Donald Trump in the Republican Primary. He hopes he can remind the Republican Party that it’s supposed to be the party of fiscal responsibility and fiscal restraint.

Mark Sanford, former Governor of South Carolina and former Congressman, is on the final stretch of a 3,500-mile road trip. He began at Independence Hall on October 16th and plans on finishing his journey on October 23rd at the Reagan Library in California. Yesterday, he stopped in at the Utah State Capitol building, where I was able to meet him and speak at great length about our country’s current situation.

He carries with him a large cardboard check, like what you would see if Publishers Clearing House showed up at your door. But there is nothing celebratory about this check. The check reads “PAY TO THE ORDER OF Burden of Future Generations,” with a listed amount of one trillion dollars, representing the 2019 deficit. This is, by the way, the largest peacetime deficit in United States history.

The questions posed to him by the reporters who briefly interviewed him were typical. Why would he launch a presidential campaign with virtually no chance of winning and against a Republican president who has consistently polled over 90% approval within his party? Mark Sanford’s answers were sobering.

Mark Sanford’s chief concern is that no one is championing fiscal conservatism. While President Trump campaigned in 2016 on not only combating the deficit but eliminating the national debt, there has been no substantive efforts to live up to these promises. In fact, it has been the complete opposite. The deficit has increased under President Trump towards the numbers only seen at the height of President Obama’s stimulus initiatives. This year’s deficit, now well over 1 Trillion dollars, is a number more than double the deficit of President Obama’s last year in office.

Mark Sanford’s warnings are dire. He says there’s a fire coming and that it could be much worse than the recent recession. He warns it could be more like the Great Depression in its devastation. The path the country is on is simply not sustainable. He’s concerned that Republicans, who used to champion this message, have adopted a bombastic form of political expression built around the personality of Donald Trump. In their fervor they have abandoned many of the elements that make the conservative movement conservative. Chief among these abandoned principles are the worthy goals of reduced spending and a balanced budget.

Mark Sanford has no delusions about his chances. He understands the possibility of defeating Donald Trump in the Republican Primary is extremely remote. But he still believes Republicans are fundamentally fiscally conservative. He hopes his campaign can jolt them into remembering that they’re supposed to be the political party of fiscal responsibility and fiscal restraint.

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