Mystery Woman on Lindsey Graham’s Disney World ‘Friends’ Trip Revealed as Middle East Power Player as Insiders Detail Their Bond

Three months before Lindsey Graham’s death, the 71-year-old late senator unexpectedly became the subject of online speculation after he was seen visiting Disney World with an unidentified woman.

The Daily Mail has now identified the woman as Morgan Ortagus, 43, a former Middle East envoy under Donald Trump whose appointment Graham had reportedly helped secure.

Graham died Saturday night following a heart emergency, only hours after returning from Ukraine, where he had met with President Volodymyr Zelensky. Known for maintaining a relentless work schedule, he rarely took time away for personal vacations.

That made his March appearance at Disney World all the more surprising, particularly after he was photographed holding a bubble wand and riding Space Mountain with Ortagus, then still publicly unidentified, beside him.

For some insiders at the White House and State Department, however, Ortagus’s presence was not unexpected. Sources said the two were frequently together, and Graham was also said to be fond of her young daughter.

“Their relationship was so strange. Everybody at the State Department, Congress, whoever knew them would say the same thing. They would not only work together but also had a deep personal relationship as well,” a State Department employee familiar with their relationship said.

The source added that Graham and Ortagus would meet for dinners and drinks and were also seen shopping together.

Ortagus married attorney Jonathan Weinberger in 2013. The couple share a daughter, who was born in 2020.

She officially separated from her husband in November. The fairytale ended when he filed for divorce in Nashville, Tennessee, where the couple lived in a $2.25 million estate with their young daughter and dog, Ozzy.

Ortagus separated from her husband Jonathan Weinberger in November, according to their divorce filing

Ortagus is now a single mom, caring for her daughter.

‘He was always so nice to Morgan’s daughter as well. The three of them would hang out together,’ the same source further detailed. ‘They were like one big happy family.’

After the divorce filing, insiders say she started dating a Lebanese international financier and film producer.

Ortagus built her name as a Fox News pundit and State Department spokeswoman in Trump’s first term, defending his America First agenda before reinventing herself as a Middle East dealmaker. She is also a Navy reservist and former pageant contestant. 

Her reputation was forged behind the scenes of the historic 2020 Abraham Accords, where she worked closely with the White House to help facilitate the normalization of relations between Israel and several Arab nations.

She stepped into the spotlight in the spring of 2019 when sworn in to be the US State Department spokesperson for then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Following the end of Trump’s first term in 2021, Ortagus temporarily transitioned to the private sector, co-founding a healthcare investment firm and launching Polaris National Security, a conservative foreign policy think tank.

During this time, she also maintained a close working relationship with Graham, co-authoring national security op-eds and advocating for a robust US Navy.

This paved the way for her return to active diplomacy in January 2025, when Trump appointed her to the front lines of Middle East statecraft alongside Envoy Steve Witkoff, tasking her with navigating the Lebanese border negotiations and managing regional deterrence against Iran.

She moved on from that role after over a year of working for Witkoff – taking on the role of counselor to the US Mission to the United Nations, where she currently serves.

At the time of their Disney meeting in March, Graham played down the spontaneous theme park getaway, leaving out Ortagus’s name when asked who he was spending time with. 

He told several outlets who inquired about the trip that he had been at a meeting with Trump’s Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff in South Florida, and simply hit Orlando afterward to spend some time with friends.

Morgan was traveling for work as well during that time and took her daughter to Disney, where she and Graham met up.

Multiple State Department insiders familiar with both of them say Graham’s relationship with Ortagus was ‘extremely close.’

‘Yes, they had had a long-standing close relationship,’ a source familiar with the matter told the Daily Mail.

A Graham spokesperson said he believed Ortagus was ‘very talented’ and had a ‘bright future in foreign policy.’

‘She is widely viewed by his colleagues as very capable, respected, well–liked, and knowledgeable about the dynamics of the Middle East,’ the spokesperson remarked.

Graham and Ortagus first became professionally intertwined through their work in conservative foreign policy during the Trump administration.

Their paths converged significantly while Ortagus was serving as the State Department spokesperson and Graham was leading key Senate committees, with the two quickly forming a close working dynamic centered on Middle East policy.

This translated into the field as they partnered on diplomatic missions to countries like Israel and Lebanon.

In political circles, Graham was widely known as her primary political protector, helping her get back into the Trump fold during his second term.

Her history of publicly bashing Trump as he ran for his first term, calling his behavior ‘disgusting’ and suggesting he had the temperament of a ‘middle school pubescent boy’ put them on a collision course.

But despite those comments, Pompeo successfully installed her into the influential State Department spokesperson role, which she held for three years.

‘Pompeo is trying to find that middle ground between Reagan national security and America First,’ Graham said in 2019.

‘What Pompeo saw in Morgan was someone who understood his worldview, shares his worldview and has the ability to communicate.’

Years later, as Trump took the White House for the second time, Graham was the key to getting her back into Trump’s fold. 

‘[He was] her one patron, right?’ the same source added, revealing that the Senator leveraged his influence to secure her the envoy role.

Three State Department sources tell the Daily Mail that Ortagus originally wanted other high-level diplomatic posts, including UN Ambassador, Ambassador to Saudi Arabia or Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs.

But when those failed, Graham used his political leverage with Trump to help secure her job as Witkoff’s deputy after his 2025 inauguration.

‘Lindsey went to [Trump], and said look Mr President, you know if you want my help on this and that, it’d be great if you could appoint Morgan to this job in Steve [Witkoff’s] office,’ the source told the Daily Mail, revealing a sentiment confirmed by two other sources.

Her tenuous position was evident after Trump’s frosty Truth Social post conveyed his personal reluctance after Graham’s demand.

When Trump tapped her to join Witkoff’s team, he quipped on Truth Social: ‘Early on Morgan fought me for three years, but hopefully has learned her lesson. These things usually don’t work out, but she has strong Republican support, and I’m not doing this for me, I’m doing it for them. Let’s see what happens.’

Turns out, that Republican support was Graham.

Graham had emerged as Ortagus’s fiercest protector, a bond those close to both called ‘strange and unexplainable’ given her rocky history with Trump. 

But she only remained in the role for one year before leaving to become a counselor to the UN.

A representative for Witkoff did not respond to the Daily Mail’s request for comment on the nature of Ortagus’s appointment and departure.

‘They couldn’t be more different from one another,’ a White House staffer remarked about Ortagus and Graham.

In his absence, Ortagus will undoubtedly continue to channel Graham’s worldview – championing funding for Ukraine, maintaining a hard line against Russia and projecting the traditional war–hawk stance that he was well known.

Ortagus has consistently maintained a traditional, hawkish posture on Russia and supported assisting Ukraine. She has repeatedly defended the first Trump administration’s record on countering Russia, frequently pointing out that they sent over $1.4 billion in lethal and military aid to Ukraine.

As for Iran, much like Graham, she is a staunch defender of the ‘maximum pressure’ campaign against Tehran. She strongly advocated for squeezing the regime through heavy economic sanctions and has been supportive of military strikes in the country.

Shortly after his passing, Ortagus posted on X saying she is ‘truly at a loss of words.’

‘[I] cannot properly convey how deeply heartbroken I am by this news. Senator Graham, Lindsey, was so much to so many people, but to me he was one of my best friends. I will write more later when I can find the words,’ she wrote.

Ortagus did not respond to inquiries and the White House declined to comment.