Ex-Senator’s Alleged Affair With Married Bodyguard: New Details Emerge

Former Senator Kyrsten Sinema remains in a relationship with her former bodyguard, according to new court filings. The filings say the pair began an affair in 2024, despite the bodyguard’s wife confronting Sinema directly at the time.

The claim is among several striking disclosures in Sinema’s sworn testimony, submitted to a federal court in North Carolina. A judge is expected to decide this week whether a lawsuit brought by the bodyguard’s former wife should proceed to trial.

Sinema’s latest deposition offers new details about the timing, circumstances and secrecy surrounding her relationship with Matthew Ammel, a US Army veteran who was married and had children when the alleged affair began.

Further evidence is expected to emerge during an evidentiary hearing at the US District Court in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The proceeding will focus on Sinema’s effort to dismiss a so-called “homewrecker lawsuit” filed by Heather Ammel.

Court filings indicate that both sides intend to question witnesses and present selected evidence during the hearing.

If the judge allows the case to move forward to a civil trial, Sinema could face significant financial exposure, including the possibility of substantial legal damages.

Conflicting testimony deepens Sinema lawsuit 

In her new testimony, Sinema said Matthew Ammel was the first to make a romantic advance. She testified that the encounter took place in the backyard of a Napa, California, Airbnb during Memorial Day weekend in 2024, while Ammel was working for her.

Sinema told the court that her then-bodyguard unexpectedly kissed her sometime between 1 and 2 a.m. She said the two then went to his room and had sex for the first time, beginning a relationship that continued afterward.

She denied that she had flirted with Ammel or expressed romantic interest in him before the Napa trip.

That account appears to conflict with earlier sworn testimony from Ammel, who said Sinema had shown interest and acted flirtatiously from the time they met in 2022.

Heather Ammel has also testified that she and her former husband discussed what she described as Sinema’s flirtatious conduct on at least one occasion.

The conflicting accounts could become significant in the case. Heather Ammel has already asked the court to restrict her former husband’s more recent attempt to participate in Sinema’s legal defense.

Sinema testified that the relationship continued into June, when she and Ammel attended the Manhattan wedding of CNN host Jessica Dean and Blackstone managing director Alex Katz. The ceremony was officiated by Kaitlan Collins, Dean’s fellow CNN correspondent.

According to the testimony, the pair later had sexual encounters in several US cities, including Washington, DC; Aspen, Colorado; and Phoenix.

A central issue is whether the relationship continued in North Carolina. The judge is expected to hear arguments from Sinema’s attorneys and Heather Ammel’s legal team about where certain messages sent by Sinema to Matthew Ammel were transmitted.

Cellphone location records and tower data could play an important role in resolving that question during the evidentiary hearing.

The lengthy sworn declaration appears to clash with earlier testimony from Sinema and Heather Ammel, adding uncertainty to an already complicated timeline and making it more difficult for the defendants to persuade the court to dismiss the lawsuit.

Encrypted messages and legal stakes 

The dates of messages sent on Signal, the encrypted app, are also in dispute. Sinema conceded in her deposition that she failed to save certain messages, which expire by design, including some she considered important. Much of the timeline has therefore been reconstructed by Ms Ammel’s lawyers.

Sinema testified that she first crossed paths with then-Mrs Ammel in December 2023, at a U2 concert in Las Vegas. She saw the couple arguing on a balcony, she said, but otherwise noticed nothing amiss.

The two women would not speak again for months — until Mrs Ammel allegedly intercepted a Signal message reading: ‘Putting my hand on your heart. I’ll see you soon. I miss you.’

‘Are you sleeping with my husband?’ Mrs Ammel shot back. Sinema says she never answered.

North Carolina is one of only a handful of states that still lets a jilted spouse sue the third party they blame for wrecking their marriage — a 19th century relic known as alienation of affection, scrapped almost everywhere else.

Such suits are rarely brought. But when they are, Tar Heel juries have proved unsparing, tacking zero after zero onto the age-old injury of a broken heart. Recent verdicts have run into the millions.

Should the case reach trial, Sinema could be ordered to pay compensatory and punitive damages dwarfing the sum named in Mrs Ammel’s complaint.

High-stakes precedent in alienation suit 

Sinema testified there has been no break in the relationship since it began in May 2024. As of July 2026, she said, the pair meet roughly twice a month, in Arizona or California, where they live. 

Ms Ammel’s lawyers argue enough of the contact touched North Carolina to keep the case there. In a written declaration, she said she was at the marital residence when Sinema ‘sent a photo of herself wrapped in a towel’. ‘I was standing in our kitchen when I read the message,’ she said.

She still faces a steep burden. 

To win, a plaintiff must show the marriage held ‘real affection’ before any outsider appeared; that the ‘love and affection’ was destroyed or badly diminished; and that the defendant caused that destruction.

Those who clear it have been rewarded lavishly. 

A Guilford County jury awarded Cynthia Shackelford $9 million against her husband’s alleged mistress in 2010. 

In 2018 a Durham County judge put the figure at $8.8 million for BMX show promoter Keith King, who accused another man of stealing his wife and wrecking his business.

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