Former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) detailed her affair with her former bodyguard in a deposition last month as part of a lawsuit filed by the bodyguard’s ex-wife.

Sinema is being sued “under North Carolina’s rare legal statute that allows a deserted spouse to seek damages from a third party for the destruction of a marital relationship,” Newsweek reports. Heather Ammel is seeking more than $75,000 in damages.

According to the deposition obtained by People, Sinema detailed her affair with her former bodyguard, Matthew Ammel, saying she first had sex with Ammel around Memorial Day 2024 while they were staying at an Airbnb in Napa, California.

“We were outside. Matt kissed me. We went inside and had sex,” Sinema said, according to the transcript.

Ammel was hired as Sinema’s bodyguard in 2022, and according to the September 2025 lawsuit filed by Ammel’s ex-wife, Matthew Ammel and Sinema went on several trips together alone. Heather Ammel met Sinema in 2023 at a U2 concert in Las Vegas, according to the lawsuit, and a month later, Heather Ammel said, she found “romantic and lascivious” texts between her husband and Sinema, including one message that included a photo of Sinema wrapped in a towel.

But in her deposition, Sinema said the affair didn’t start until 2024. One month after Sinema said they first had sex in Napa, California, she said she and Matthew Ammel were “intimate” in New York City while they were there to attend the wedding of CNN anchor Jessica Dean.

Sinema, who has said she knew Matthew Ammel was married with children, continued to have sex with him in the following months, according to her deposition. They had sex at her Washington, D.C., apartment, during a trip in Aspen, Colorado, and then again at her Phoenix home.

The locations matter because, in court documents filed in March, Sinema said the lawsuit should be dismissed because her affair with Matthew Ammel “occurred exclusively outside of North Carolina,” according to The Washington Post.

Heather Ammel’s lawsuit details the gifts Sinema allegedly gave Matthew Ammel, including a massage gun so Sinema could “work” on his back at her apartment. Sinema also allegedly suggested that Matthew Ammel, who suffered from PTSD from his time in the military, bring MDMA on a work trip, so she could guide him through a psychedelic experience.

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