COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens, now a leading Republican Senate candidate, was physically abusive and demonstrated such “unstable and coercive behavior” that steps were taken to limit his access to firearms, according to new allegations from his ex-wife revealed in court records.
A sworn affidavit from Sheena Greitens and filed Monday is part of an ongoing child custody dispute in Missouri. A public affairs professor at the University of Texas, she sought divorce from Eric Greitens after a sex scandal which led to his resignation as governor in June 2018. She’s now asking the court to move the custody case to the Austin area, in part to spare her children from renewed public attention as Eric Greitens tries to mount a political comeback.
Eric Greitens called the allegations “completely fabricated” and “baseless.”
“I am seeking full custody of my sons, and for their sake, I will continue to pray for their mother and hope that she gets the help that she needs,” he said in a statement issued from his Twitter account.
His attorney on Monday asked a judge to block the affidavit from public view, saying open access could cause “irreparable harm to his reputation and his candidacy.”
An attorney for Sheena Greitens did not respond to a message seeking comment.
The allegations could complicate his bid to emerge from Missouri’s Aug. 2 primary as the GOP nominee and potentially jeopardize his party’s chance to hold onto a key Senate seat in the general election.
In the affidavit, Sheena Greitens casts her ex-husband as someone who threatened to use his political connections and influence in order to destroy her reputation to win custody of the children.
“Prior to our divorce, during an argument in late April 2018, Eric knocked me down and confiscated my cell phone, wallet and keys so that I was unable to call for help or extricate myself and our children from our home,” Sheena Greitens wrote in the filing. “I became afraid for my safety and that of our children at our home,” later adding that his “behavior included physical violence toward our children, such as cuffing our then-3-year-old son across the face at the dinner table in front of me and yanking him around by his hair.”
In 2019, one of her sons came home from a visit with his dad “with a swollen face, bleeding gums and loose tooth,” she said.
“He said Dad had hit him; however, Eric said they were roughhousing and it had been an accident,” Sheena Greitens wrote, adding that the tooth eventually had to be removed.
Once a swing state, Missouri has become more reliably Republican in recent years. But the race to succeed retiring Sen. Roy Blunt is nonetheless receiving national attention because some in the GOP establishment are anxious that, with the allegations released on Monday and previous scandals, Greitens would face vulnerabilities against a Democrat. And with the Senate evenly divided, the GOP can’t afford to lose what would otherwise be a safe seat.
Other candidates in the race on Monday called for Greitens to end his campaign.
“Real men never abuse women and children. Period, end of story,” GOP U.S. Rep. Vicky Hartzler said in a recorded statement posted on Twitter. “It’s time for Eric to get out of the Senate race and to get professional help.”
Missouri’s Republican Attorney General Eric Schmitt, who is also running, tweeted: “The behavior described in this affidavit is cause for Eric Greitens to be in prison, not on the ballot for U.S. Senate.”
Sen. Josh Hawley, a Republican who will become Missouri’s senior senator when Blunt steps down, also said it was “time for Eric Greitens to leave this race.”
