Raleigh, North Carolina – former US Senator Kyrsten Sinema She admits to having a romantic relationship with a member of her security guard that began when she was a deputy, according to legal documents. But she also stresses that she should not be subjected to Lawsuit from the man’s ex-wife Who can blame Sinema for the breakup of a marriage?
The lawsuit filed in federal court in North Carolina seeks financial damages from Sinema, who represented Arizona in the U.S. House of Representatives and then in the Senate for one term that ended early last year.
Heather Amell claims in a lawsuit that she and her husband, Matthew, had a “good, loving marriage” and that “true love and affection” existed between them before Sinema intervened, pursuing him despite knowing he was married.
In a declaration signed March 7 and attached to a response to the lawsuit filed this week, Sinema said her relationship with Matthew Amell “became romantic and intimate” at the end of May 2024 and “physically intimate” over the next few months in California, New York, Colorado, Arizona and Washington, D.C. The Amells separated in November 2024, the lawsuit said.
North Carolina is one of the few states that allows abandoned spouses to file a lawsuit for “abandonment of affection” to seek damages from a third party responsible for the breakup of their marriage.
Sinema’s declaration rejects Heather Amell’s claims that Sinema made phone calls and sent Internet communications to her husband knowing that he was physically present in North Carolina and at times with his wife and their children. Sinema sent a letter to Matthew Hamel while he was in North Carolina after he had already found a new place to live and “when the marriage had effectively ended,” Sinema attorney Stephen Epstein wrote in a motion to dismiss.
“Sinema’s conduct relating to her romantic relationship with Mr. Amiel does not connect her to North Carolina in any meaningful way,” Epstein wrote Thursday, adding that no jury would believe the single letter “had any effect on the destruction of marital love and affection.”
Sinema’s security chief hired Ammel after he retired from the Army in 2022, according to the lawsuit, and in early 2024, Heather Ammel discovered messages between Sinema and her husband on the messaging app Signal that were of a “romantic and lascivious nature.” That summer, the lawsuit alleges, Matthew Amell stopped wearing his wedding ring, and Sinema gave him a job on her Senate staff while he continued to work as her bodyguard.
The lawsuit was initially filed late last year in North Carolina state court, but was moved to federal court in January.
Sinema declined to run for re-election to the Senate in 2024 after a stint in which she left the Democratic Party To become independent. She now works for a Washington-based law and lobbying firm.