Greitens: There Is 'Tremendous Human Tragedy on the Border'

Former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens, a former Democrat turned Republican, joined SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Sunday where he discussed his run for the U.S. Senate in Missouri and what led him to his decision.

“I’m a Navy Seal, I did four deployments overseas, including to Iraq and Afghanistan. I’ve always been a fighter,” Greitens said. “Came back home after my team was hit by a suicide truck bomb and then worked together with my fellow veterans to find ways to help men and women who are coming home who have post traumatic stress disorder, who have traumatic brain injuries, who had lost eyesight. We banded together.”

Greitens also noted his career as Missouri’s governor, saying his team “killed a politicians pay raise, we took on the swamp, we ended a corrupt insider tax program, and slammed shut the revolving door between the executive branch and lobbyists.”

“I think this is a critical time in our country. We don’t need Rhinos, we don’t need people who are going to bend a knee to the swamp. We need people who are willing to stand up, fight against the left, fight against the swamp. I look forward to defending President Trump’s America First policies and protecting the people of Missouri from the kind of lunatic policies we’re seeing from Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi. This is a critical time. We are all in and have a fanatic grassroots campaign,” he said.

“I was attacked by the left and I was attacked by the swamp because I was a fighter for the people of Missouri,” Greitens told host Matthew Boyle, recalling a series of investigations and allegations that began in 2018. “I have emerged from this. I am even stronger. Got a fantastic team. The grassroots of Missouri recognize the truth.”

“I was born and raised a Democrat,” Greitens continued. “I liked people so when I grew up I thought well I must be a Democrat. Plus I was from Missouri, the home of Harry Truman and he was a Democrat.” Greitens said he later grew to have a different perception of the Democrat Party while doing humanitarian work overseas.

“I started doing international humanitarian work and this was before I was a Navy Seal. I went and I worked with kids who survived ethnic clinging in Bosnia, I worked with kids who were survivors of genocide in Rwanda, worked with kids who had lost limbs to landmines in Cambodia. In all of those cases what I saw was that the rhetoric of care was coming out of the left, but they weren’t really paying attention to what was happening on the ground. They weren’t really paying attention to the policies that work for people who needed help,” he said.

“I watched the government fail my friends again and again and again,” Greitens said as he reflected on the government’s handling of certain issues after his return to the United States.

“America First policies work for people. We saw during President Trump’s administration broad-based prosperity. We saw through President Trump’s administration peace through strength, we saw during President Trump’s administration they way that standing up for our law enforcement officers helps to bring about safer streets and law and order. I think one of the things that we have to do, as conservatives, as America First patriots, is point out the heartlessness of the left. If you really care about people, then you’ve got to fight for them and you’ve got to do what works for them. You look at the heartlessness of Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer keeping kids with learning disabilites out of school for years because they’re not willing to stand up and fight for those kids,” Greitens said.

Greitens also noted the “crisis on the border” as being a “public safety crisis, a crime crisis, a national security crisis, a public health crisis.”

“It is tremendous human tragedy on the border,” Greitens stated. “We need to demonstrate the heartlessness of the left. People are dying because of Joe Biden’s policies. He has turned over the border to Mexican cartels and drug gangs and coyotes and they are hurting people. They’re hurting some of the most vulnerable people in the world. They are taking advantage of unaccompanied kids on the border.”

According to Greitens, Biden is “responsible for the consequences of this reckless border policy.”

“Even by the left’s own standards, this is a humanitarian crisis that they have created and it’s hurting some of the most vulnerable people in the world,” Greitens said. “We need leaders who are going to stand up and point this out every single day, not just on the border issues but on all of these issues where these lunatic, Biden policies … we need to demonstrate that this is hurting real Americans.”

An internal survey conducted by former President Trump’s pollster released on Monday showed Greiten with nearly a 40-point lead over the next closest contender in the GOP Senate primary.

The survey of 400 Republican voters showed Greitens leading with 48 percent support, followed by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, who garnered 11 percent support in the poll.

To listen to Greitens’ full interview with Breitbart News, click here.