Every election cycle, there's always some donor somewhere who winds up in trouble with the law or the tabloids, and when the story breaks, the opponents of whomever that guy gave money to call on the recipient to return the contribution or give it to charity. The unlucky candidate typically acquiesces after a few bad headlines, reluctantly cuts a check for $1,000 or $2,000, and life moves on.
But when the original donation is for a cool $1 million, boy does that ever change the calculus. In Missouri, there are no campaign contribution limits whatsoever, and wealthy conservatives have showered lavish gifts on their favored Republican candidates for governor (obviously for no consideration in return whatsoever, no siree!): Billionaire Rex Sinquefield, for instance, has given seven figures to former prosecutor Catherine Hanaway. But it's a different million-dollar donation that's at issue here, one from Silicon Valley venture capitalist Michael Goguen to former NAVY Seal Eric Greitens.
The problem? Goguen is being sued by a woman named Amber Laurel Baptiste, who has accused him of breaching an agreement to pay her $40 million as recompense, she says, for making her his sex slave over a 13-year period. Baptiste claims that Goguen had promised to rescue her from the human traffickers who had brought her to the U.S. (the two met at a strip club) but alleges the opposite happened. During their relationship, Goguen was married twice; while he disputes the abuse charges, both he and Baptiste concur that the $40 million settlement was aimed at stopping Baptiste from going public with a lawsuit against him alleging he had injured her during sex.
But after paying one $10 million installment, Goguen refused to pay out any further, calling the deal "extortion." That led to Baptiste's suit—the very sort of thing he was hoping to avoid in the first place—and it also led to his departure from his employer of 20 years, Sequoia Partners, one of the top venture firms in the country. (The company claims it was mutual.)
It's a massive public mess for Goguen, of course, but also for Greitens. As of the end of last year, Greitens had $3.4 million in his campaign war chest and faces an extremely competitive GOP primary, so parting with $1 million would be a massive blow. And even if he could just send the money back, the sheer size of the donation magnifies the "taint factor," since why else would Goguen give Greitens so much if he weren't hoping to elect a governor beholden to him?
At a Republican debate Thursday night, Greitens' rivals pounded him. Hanaway said he should give Goguen's donations to a women's shelter, while Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder pointed out that a super PAC supporting John Kasich just said it would turn over $250,000 it received from Goguen to charities fighting human trafficking. Greitens refused to budge, saying that "unlike career politicians, I'm not going to convict someone in the court of public opinion."
That phony high-minded dodge won't save him, though. "Innocent until proven guilty" is a foundational principle inside the courthouse, but it doesn't work on the campaign trail. Greitens can expect to hear about this from now through the Aug. 2 primary, and there's only one way to make the bleeding stop if he wants the chance to take on Democrat Chris Koster in the general election. But the cure is almost as painful as the disease, and it shows why even the greediest politicians shouldn't want to live in a world with limitless campaign contributions.