Greitens' abrupt resignation should make us worry about dark money

Show Caption Hide Caption Governor Greitens' resignation: 5 things you need to know Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens announced his resignation Tuesday afternoon, leaving behind a brief and tumultuous legacy and moving on from his first public office with the continued prospect of criminal prosecution related to his 2016 campaign.

It seemed almost inevitable that Eric Greitens would fight until the end to be Missouri’s governor.

On the night of his State of the State address, when news broke that he’d had an affair before he was elected, there were rumblings that he might resign.

As more damaging details emerged and both Democrats and Republicans called on the governor to resign, he consistently doubled down. He seemed more likely to barricade himself into the governor’s mansion than to quietly step down.

Greitens had his share of public dust-ups even before the news of his previous relationship with a woman in St. Louis. Most mildly, he was difficult to work with, making lawmakers even in his own party unhappy. But that was to be expected given his campaigning against the status quo.

More controversially, he deployed a number of tactics to stack the Missouri Board of Education. It showed disregard for the intentionally bipartisan nature of the board and called into question the ethics of his behavior. Again, however, this was the politician he said he’d be.

He would fight, and it might get ugly and he’d never be ashamed.

That profile reached unexpected heights throughout the saga of the affair, and for good reason. The actions of which Greitens is accused are terrible — nonconsensual sex, violence, blackmail in the form of “revenge porn.”

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None of it seemed to faze him. He would drag everyone through the mud if he had to, content to let his past transgressions cloud the work of the Missouri government; content to let the story be repeated over and over at the expense of the other woman, her family and Greitens’ own family.

And the story was repeated — often. It was certainly an important story to tell, given our society continues to grapple with the concept of consent and power balance. It was also an issue those of us outside the political world could wrap our heads around because it’s a problem that exists across all walks of life.

And, of course, the details were sometimes salacious.

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Even when Greitens announced his resignation Tuesday, headlines across the country continued to focus on the alleged sexual misconduct.

But that doesn’t appear to be the reason he finally put up the white flag.

Instead, his resignation came just hours after a Cole County judge ruled that Greitens would have to respond to subpoenas seeking information about his political campaign and from A New Missouri Inc., the secretive nonprofit formed by his campaign aides to advocate for his agenda.

A day later, a St. Louis prosecutor dropped the investigation.

The man who seemed prepared to fight until the end, regardless of what we discovered about sexual misconduct, changed his tune almost immediately under the threat that we might all find out who’s behind the money. And that should scare us.

Whatever information is contained in those campaign finance documents is apparently far worse than whatever occurred with a woman in St. Louis, actions which are already unfathomable to many of us.

While the invasion of privacy case could go forward and the discussion of sexual misconduct will continue to keep that important issue in the public dialogue, so too should Greitens’ fear of financial disclosure keep us talking about the role of dark money in Missouri.

And that’s an issue Missourians of all political parties should care about. We all have known mega-donors we despise. We may have different political views than the likes of Rex Sinquefield, George Soros, or the Koch brothers. And while Missourians have routinely voted in favor of contribution limits, we at least have an idea why the Sinquefields of the world are spending so much money on politics.

And as the saying goes, better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.

More and more cash flows into Missouri elections each year, and we don’t know where a lot of it is coming from. It apparently comes from donors who are so secretive about what they want that they won’t reveal themselves at any cost.

Even the unashamed, fight-until-the-end Navy SEAL governor, Eric Greitens, wasn’t about to let us see whose money was backing him.

Take this as a lesson, Missouri: Whether you’re a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian or anything else, we can’t let secret mega-donors take control of our state. We need to elect leaders and support legislation that rejects dark money.