A hairdresser testified before a Missouri House special investigative committee that her affair with Gov. Eric Greitens (R) was not always consensual, according to the committee’s report released Wednesday.
The woman, who remains anonymous, accused the future governor of inviting her to his home while his wife was out of town in March 2015. When she arrived, she told the committee, he searched her personal belongings, patted her down and checked to see if anyone saw her entering the home before having her change into men’s clothes. She testified that he told her he would teach her how to do a proper pull-up.
“And then he said, ‘First, before we start a workout, you have to be hydrated,’ and puts water in his mouth and tries to spit it in my mouth, at which point I realized he’s trying to kiss me, but I don’t even want to kiss him,” the woman’s testimony states. “So I just spit it out. He does it and he’s like, ‘You’re not going to be a bad girl, are you?’”
Greitens’ accuser continued her graphic account of the interaction, saying the governor tied her hands to pull-up rings and blindfolded her before taking off her clothes without her consent, according to the committee report.
At this point, the woman claimed, she heard the sound of a cellphone and saw “a flash through the blindfold.” This led her to believe Greitens took a nude photograph of her, a detail that has been a point of contention in the allegations.
Upon further questioning, the woman backtracked that she may have had a “dream or vision” of nude photos being taken of her, but her attorney said the governor had admitted taking photos of her more than once. Greitens was indicted in February on charges of first-degree felony invasion of privacy over the photographs and is set to stand trial in May, according to CNN.
Greitens’ accuser said that the photographs were used to blackmail her into silence. She told the committee that the governor told her not to mention his name or he would “take these pictures, and I’m going to put them everywhere I can.”
The woman testified that she asked to be let down from her bindings and tried to leave when Greitens then took her into a “bear hug.” Greitens then took off his pants and coerced her into having oral sex, she told the committee.
“I felt as though that would allow me to leave,” the woman’s testimony reads.
She also testified that she met with Greitens again in May 2015, when she had consensual oral sex with him. When she met with him in June, the woman alleged, Greitens slapped her upon learning she had sex with her estranged husband.
The slap did not leave a mark but “was just jarring. It wasn’t sweet and gentle; it was forceful,” the report states.
Greitens and the woman allegedly ended the affair in October 2015, and she never saw him again, she testified.
Although Greitens has admitted to having an extramarital affair, he denies the accusations of blackmail.
The House report notes that the governor did not cooperate with its investigation, saying that “Greitens has declined to participate in this fact-finding process at this time. Greitens declined to provide the requested testimony, documents, and sworn answers to interrogatories.”
The governor, at a news conference just before the House committee released its report, characterized the investigation as a “political witch hunt.”
“Keep in mind how this was written: No standards of evidence were used, no witnesses were cross-examined, no one who was representing me was allowed in the room and no members of the press or the public were allowed in the room,” Greitens said. “If the committee had waited 33 days, they would have received a full set of facts. Instead, it was decided to publish an incomplete document made in secret.”
Greitens, a married father of two children, called his affair a “personal mistake” and told reporters that the report would be full of “false, outlandish and salacious accusations.” He repeatedly referred to his court date “in 33 days” and insisted that he would be exonerated at trial.
Following the public release of the House committee report, Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley called on Greitens to resign, the Kansas City Star reports.
“The conduct the Report details is certainly impeachable, in my judgment, and the House is well within its rights to proceed on that front,” Hawley told the Star. “But the people of Missouri should not be put through that ordeal. Governor Greitens should resign immediately.”
The full 24-page report can be read here.
This story has been updated with the state attorney general’s comments.