Following Mark Sanford’s comfortable 9-point victory over Elizabeth Colbert-Busch, the New York Times reports:

Mark Sanford, the former South Carolina governor once so tarnished by a spectacular lie about a love affair that few expected him to recover, is now heading to Congress. Mr. Sanford beat Elizabeth Colbert Busch, a Democrat with no previous political experience, The Associated Press said about 90 minutes after polls closed.

Mrs. Colbert Busch had briefly led Mr. Sanford in early polling, buoying hopes among some voters that a Democrat would, for the first time in more than 30 years, represent the coastal district that includes Charleston.

But in the end, it was not meant to be. Voters decided that Mr. Sanford’s message about the need for fiscal overhaul and his attack on Democrats in Washington mattered more than his personal transgressions.

Fox News reports:

Sanford, who turns 53 later this month, has never lost a race in three runs for Congress and two for governor. And he said before the votes were counted Tuesday that if he lost this race, he wouldn’t run for office again.

“I think you can go back in and you can ask for a second chance in a political sense once,” he said Tuesday after voting in the special election.

EXPECT FURTHER UPDATES…

Tonight, a special election to fill Tim Scott’s congressional seat, left empty by his appointment to the Senate in December, will decide if former Republican governor Mark Sanford or Democratic newcomer Elizabeth Colbert-Busch will represent South Carolina’s 1st District.

The race has drawn considerable media attention thanks to Sanford’s messy personal conduct. As governor, he infamously used state funds to visit his mistress in Argentina in 2009, and the fallout badly damaged his public image. His attempted political comeback has also included some embarrassing moments, such as being charged with trespassing on his ex-wife’s property and subsequently being dropped by the Republican National Congressional Campaign Committee.

While Colbert-Busch once held a 9-point lead in the polls, the race tightened considerably in the days before the election, with polls essentially putting them in a dead heat going into tonight.

The 1st District’s polls close at 7 PM tonight, with results expected to be announced in the following few hours.

                                                         PREVIOUSLY…

UPDATE: The first of 317 precincts are now reporting, with Sanford holding the lead. This means nothing so early in the game, but it does indicate that we’ll know the winner relatively soon.

UPDATE II: Mark Sanford wins Colleton County with 69.7% of the vote to Elizabeth Colbert-Busch’s 29.2%

UPDATE III: The earliest numbers out of the larger, more Democratic-friendly Charleston County put Colbert-Busch ahead of Sanford with 58.7% to his 40.9%, with about 10% of precincts reporting. The total numbers are incredibly close, but Sanford holds a slight lead at 50.4% with Colbert-Busch trailing at 49.1% Nearly a third of precincts have reported.

UPDATE IV: With 42% reporting, Sanford leads with 53.7% to Colbert-Busch’s 45.8%.

UPDATE V: Over half the precincts have now reported, and Sanford has pulled ahead with 54.5%. But it’s still not hopeless for Colbert-Busch, who trails at 45.0%, as the majority of precincts in Charleston County have yet to report.

UPDATE VI: Sanford wins Beaufort County 53.0% to 46.6%. Overall, with 59% reporting, Sanford still holds his lead at 54.5%  and Colbert-Busch trails at 45.1%.

UPDATE VII: The end is nigh for Colbert-Busch, whose 45.5% trails Sanford’s 54.0%, with 71% reporting.

UPDATE VIII: The first major news organization, CNN, calls the race for Sanford in a tweet.

UPDATE IX: PolicyMic and the Huffington Post have called the race for Sanford as well; with 74% reporting, Sanford leads 54.3%-45.3%.

UPDATE X: Final numbers continue to expand the victorious Sanford’s lead, which is now nearly 10 points wide. 91% of precincts are reporting.

UPDATE XI: With all the votes now tallied, the final numbers are: Sanford 54.3% Colbert-Busch  45.2%.