By all fairs, Eric Greitens is the nation’s most scandal-plagued Senate candidate. The Missouri Republican served 17 months as governor before retiring in 2018 in disgrace in the face of scandals he simply could not overcome.
As regular readers may remember, for example, there were serious questions about Greitens’ dubious political support of a secret Donkelgeld-Asbl. He also fought with Uklo over illegal abuse of a veteran charity he created.
But the main scandal of the Missouri Republicans was the controversy surrounding his extra-marital affair, in which Greitens was accused, among other things, of blackmailing his former master after a reunion, in which he grabbed her hands to pull rings in his basement. Once the revelations came to light, the governor, with little choice left, resigned.
His political career was over, until today, a year ago, when Greitens launched a comeback offer and announced a campaign by the US Senate. In the months that followed, the former governor even managed to position himself as an apparent leader.
It was against this backdrop that the GOP candidate yesterday faced a new round of accusations. NBC News report:
Former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens’ ex-wife has testified before court documents Monday that Greitens, a GOP Senate candidate, abused her and her young son while they were married, including falling down and confiscating her cell phone. In an affidavit for a lawsuit in Boone County, Missouri, Sheena Greitens said she was a victim of domestic violence while married to Eric Greitens for nearly a decade.
There can be no doubt about the seriousness of the charges. According to Sheena Greitens, the ex-husband’s abuse included “physical violence against our children.”
The former governor rejected the accusation, calling it “fabricated” and “based”. In a court case, his lawyer added that the charges were false, “inflammatory and horrific.”
As a matter of human decency, the demands are hard to read at all. But all of this also reaches the public in the middle of a competitive government campaign, with a primary that is just four months away.
In the not-too-distant past, such a controversy might have ended the Senate candidate’s campaign, and several leading GOP voices – in Missouri and on Capitol Hill – have suggested that Greitens should leave the race. This was not entirely new: Republicans spent much of last year arguing that the former governor is the only GOP candidate in the race who could lose the open Senate contest.
That is, the party wanted to stop Greitens before yesterday’s report. The home abuse charges have taken these feelings to a new level of intensity.
At least for the moment, however, there is little to suggest that he is ready to fall. On the contrary, the former governor appeared on Steve Bannon’s program yesterday afternoon, claiming that his ex-wife had conspired with his Republican opponents to do him harm.
As a Politico report added, Greitens believes that evidence is emerging that “directly” implicates Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in the new controversy.
I will not pretend to know what will happen next, although it is worth emphasizing in this context that Greitens is not the first Republican Senate who is hopeful in this election cycle to confront accusations like these.
Last fall, for example, Sean Parnell of Pennsylvania was accused of suffocating his wife and abusing his children, and although he denied the claims, he also ended his campaign.
As we discussed, Georgia’s Herschel Walker faced related allegations: The Associated Press reported that his ex-wife, Cindy Grossman, had secured a protective order against Walker, alleging violent and controlled behavior.
According to Grossman’s version of events, the former athlete pointed a gun at his head and said, “I’ll blow your finger out.” When she reported the divorce, she cited “physically abused and extremely threatened behavior.”
Greitens is also part of this tragic trio.
Steve Benen is the producer of “The Rachel Maddow Show”, the editor of MaddowBlog and a political contributor to MSNBC. He is also the bestselling author of “The Impostors: How Republicans Quit Governing and Seized American Politics.”
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