In a stunning broadcast Wednesday night, local Missouri TV news station KMOV reported that Republican Gov. Eric Greitens had engaged in an extra-marital affair in March of 2015 with a woman whom he'd met because she cut his hair, then blackmailed her into silence by taking a photo of her nude, bound, and blindfolded. The explosive allegations came to light because the woman's now-ex-husband said that law enforcement and media outlets had recently approached him about the matter and explained that he wanted to "get in front" of the story. The ex-husband had recorded his wife confessing the affair to him and provided a copy of the recording to KMOV.
In response, Greitens admitted to the affair but denied that he had blackmailed or even photographed the woman, who has declined to be interviewed and whose name has been withheld by KMOV as a result. Greitens was elected governor in 2016 after winning a four-way GOP primary and defeating Democrat Chris Koster by a 51-46 margin. He first publicly expressed interest in running in February of 2015, about a month before his alleged affair.
Until this scandal, Greitens, a 43-year-old former Navy SEAL, had appeared to be a GOP rising star and seemed to have presidential ambitions, even traveling to Iowa to meet with activists last year. Now his political future looks grave. Greitens has spent his first year in office at war with his fellow Republicans in the legislature, leaving him with few friends and many enemies during this crisis. As one anonymous Missouri lawmaker put it to reporter Dave Catanese, "Eric Greitens spent a year calling every Republican in the state corrupt. I'll be shocked if any of them stand up for him as an alleged blackmailing psychopath."
It's reminiscent of the problems that beset two other, very different former governors: Oregon's John Kitzhaber and New York's Eliot Spitzer. Both had failed to cultivate and even antagonized fellow Democrats, and when scandals came home to roost, there was no one willing to stand up for them. But the Greitens matter is far worse: Spitzer had engaged the services of prostitutes, while Kitzhaber was accused of being complicit in allowing his fiancée to use her access to the governor for financial gain; both quickly resigned.
But while the political backdrop might be similar, the charges against Greitens are much more serious. Indeed, one Republican state legislator has already asked state Attorney General Josh Hawley to investigate the matter, while another issued a barely veiled call for Greitens to resign. A third, state Sen. Rob Schaff, even tweeted, "Stick a fork in him." Republican leaders in both chambers of the legislature, meanwhile, released similar statements calling the allegations "shocking" and "concerning" and demanded candor from the governor. If Greitens is forced to leave office, Lt. Gov. Mike Parson, a fellow Republican, would take his place and would serve out the remainder of his term, which ends in 2020.