NEW: Longtime Democrat Senator Admits To Affair With Bodyguard

Former Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is asking a court to toss out a lawsuit accusing her of having an affair with a married bodyguard during her time in office.

The complaint was filed in Moore County, North Carolina, in September 2025 by the former bodyguard’s ex-wife following the couple’s separation over the alleged relationship.

Court filings describe a relationship between Sinema and her bodyguard, identified as Matthew Ammel, that allegedly began shortly after he started working for the senator.

In a motion to dismiss filed this week, Sinema acknowledged that she and Ammel began a romantic relationship in May 2024, roughly five months before Ammel separated from his wife.

But Sinema argues the case should be thrown out because the North Carolina court lacks jurisdiction. According to the filing, the relationship occurred “exclusively outside of North Carolina.”

The motion says nearly all communications between Sinema and Ammel took place while both were outside the state. It claims the only contact that occurred while Ammel was in North Carolina happened in October 2024, after he had already moved out of the home he shared with his wife.

The lawsuit alleges the relationship first intersected with Ammel’s marriage during a December 2023 trip to Las Vegas. According to the complaint, Sinema asked Ammel to serve as her “security” so she could attend a U2 concert at the Sphere. Ammel reportedly invited his wife along on the trip, presenting it as a “gift.” After the concert, Ammel and his wife went out for drinks.

The complaint states the wife later discovered that Sinema and Ammel had begun communicating more frequently the following month using Signal, an encrypted messaging app. Court papers claim the texts appeared to have “exceeded the bounds of a normal working relationship and were of romantic and lascivious natures.”

The filings also allege Sinema instructed Ammel to “bring MDMA drugs on a work trip” so she could “guide him through a psychedelic experience.”

Former Senator Kyrsten Sinema

Other incidents described in the complaint include a trip to the Innings Festival, where Sinema allegedly became “handsy with him,” as well as travel to San Francisco, where the two reportedly “stayed together for hours.” The pair also allegedly attended a Taylor Swift concert and visited Napa Valley, California.

The ex-wife is seeking damages under North Carolina’s “alienation of affection” law, which allows a spouse to sue a third party accused of interfering in a marriage and causing a couple’s “love and affection” to be destroyed through “wrongful and malicious acts.” She is also seeking punitive damages.

According to court filings, Sinema and Ammel remain “engaged in a romantic and sexual relationship.”

Ammel was initially hired and paid through Sinema’s campaign account. Records show that by the summer of 2024, while she was still serving in the Senate, Ammel had been placed on her official Senate payroll as a staff member.

Sinema left Congress after the 2024 election, opting not to seek reelection after a turbulent single term in which she broke with progressives and left the Democratic Party to become an independent.

She now works at the Washington-based legal and lobbying firm Hogan Lovells, where she has lobbied on issues including data center development and research funding for the psychedelic drug ibogaine.

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