"In what could be a first nationwide, the husband of South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley is heading on a yearlong National Guard deployment to Afghanistan, starting in January," The State reports.
Michael Haley, the South Carolina newspaper says, is "a first lieutenant in the SC National Guard [and] will be part of an agribusiness team of 100 to 200 Guard members in Afghanistan."
Delaware Attorney Gen. Beau Biden, son of Vice President Joe Biden, served in Afghanistan from 2008 into 2009. Sons of both candidates on the Republican ticket in 2008 — Sen. John McCain and then-Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin — served in Iraq.
But National Guard Association spokesman John Goheen tells The State he doesn't know of any other gubernatorial spouses who have been sent to either the Iraq or Afghan combat zones.
Gov. Haley, a Republican, was elected governor in 2010. WLTX-TV in Columbia, S.C., has a video report here. "The kids and I couldn't be more proud of him," Gov. Haley said of her husband.
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