WASHINGTON — Sen. Chris Murphy was noticed at a Washington, DC, watering gap on a date with a progressive media mogul and strategist who’s boosted his efforts as a number one anti-Trump politician in Congress — simply months after the Connecticut Democrat introduced he and his spouse have been separating.
Murphy, 51, was caught “cuddling” with Courier Newsroom writer Tara McGowan, 39, final Monday by the bar on the Purple Hen, situated only one mile north of Capitol Hill within the District’s Bloomingdale neighborhood, a supply informed The Publish, sharing a photograph of the pair’s romantic rendezvous.
The supply stated Murphy wrapped his arm round McGowan’s shoulder at one level, and the 2 have been “being cutesy” whereas scanning the menu collectively for rustic Italian fare.
The comfortable outing befell the night time earlier than President Trump’s deal with to a joint session of Congress, which the senator sat out.
The Democratic lawmaker is outwardly nonetheless married to his spouse, Cathy Holahan, a lawyer based mostly in Washington, as neither has filed for divorce in Connecticut or DC, per public courtroom information. The couple introduced they have been parting methods final November.
A DC Dem insider informed Semafor that McGowan is having a love affair with the senator — and shared a selfie of them on her personal Instagram final week with the caption “not postponing joy.”
As of Monday morning, McGowan had deactivated her X account.
Murphy and his spouse met on the College of Connecticut’s regulation college, married in 2007 and have two youngsters collectively. They revealed their separation in an e-mail first reported by the Hartford Courant after the 2024 election.
“After much reflection and discussion, we have decided to separate as a couple,” they wrote in a Nov. 15 missive to an in depth group of pals after 17 years of marriage.
“We accomplish that with deep care and respect for one another, and with a deal with persevering with to be pals and loving, collaborative mother and father to our boys whom we like.
“This was a difficult decision, but we believe that it is right for us, and we are going to move onto this new path the right way,” they added. “We will continue to support each other personally and professionally. And we hope you all will stay connected with both of us.”
McGowan was till final yr married to Michael Halle, a fellow Dem strategist and former senior adviser to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. He additionally served on the presidential campaigns of Buttigieg, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
The Courier founder and writer filed for divorce in Could 2023, citing “irreconcilable differences,” and the wedding was dissolved the next yr in April, Rhode Island state courtroom filings present.
A self-described “childless woman voter,” McGowan has used her private platform and place for years on the digital outlet to advertise Murphy, retweeting his TV appearances and touting his “pro-democracy” stances and coverage priorities on gun management, immigration and overseas relations.
“Beyond original newsletters, podcasts + social video series, COURIER’s new national vertical will publish video opinion pieces from prominent pro-democracy leaders fighting for our rights and freedoms, like this call from U.S. Senator @ChrisMurphyCT to ban assault weapons in [America],” she reposted one of many outlet’s X messages in November 2023, two months after her remaining divorce continuing listening to.
“Republicans wanted — demanded — border legislation. Democrats, led by @ChrisMurphyCT, negotiated a bipartisan deal,” acknowledged one other Feb. 7, 2024, X publish by Courier that includes a video interviewing Murphy.
“Now, because of Trump’s hold over the GOP, the bill is dead. Here is Murphy on why you should never again believe Republicans when they talk about the border.”
Murphy has emerged as a number one voice of Democrats’ resistance to Trump, sounding the alarm in an interview with the New York Occasions final month that his social gathering’s “political brand is fundamentally broken, the rule of law is disintegrating and a lot of people still don’t know what Trump’s actual agenda is.”
Extra just lately, McGowan had been continually reposting his X account’s movies in addition to TV hits.
“Trump sides with dictators [because] it legitimizes his plan for America: A Russian-style kleptocracy where the rich steal from us to enrich themselves,” Murphy stated in a publish sharing a March interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Dana Bash, which was retweeted by McGowan.
Critics of Courier — which was based in 2019, is backed by Acronym and has since been acquired by McGowan’s newest enterprise, Good Data, Inc. — have charged that it’s a liberal darkish cash outfit “masquerading as a news outlet,” although the FEC unanimously dismissed a grievance claiming that.
At the least one former Courier worker dished to NOTUS final March, nonetheless, that the aim of the eight-newsroom outlet, positioned in a number of key swing states, “was to get persuadable voters engaged with unassuming content” on their social media feeds earlier than linking out to “political persuasion content.”
The for-profit information group — funded by the liberal billionaires George Soros and Reid Hoffman — can be considered one of a number of lefty pop-up teams that McGowan has based for the reason that first Trump administration.
In 2017, she co-founded Lockwood Technique, a political marketing campaign agency that helped Virginia Democrats retake the state legislature inside two years. Digital adverts rolled out by Lockwood additionally helped shoppers corresponding to Deliberate Parenthood and the Nationwide Democratic Redistricting Committee.
McGowan the identical yr additionally arrange a political motion committee, PACRONYM, which raised greater than $18 million to oppose President Trump’s 2020 re-election marketing campaign, per federal election marketing campaign filings, and a left-wing 501(c)(4) referred to as ACRONYM.
Each raked in hundreds of thousands from dark-money donors — with the latter turning into notorious as the first investor of a glitchy app that botched vote outcomes through the 2020 Democratic Iowa caucuses, delaying the tally for days, The Intercept beforehand reported.
Reps for Murphy’s workplace didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. Neither did McGowan, Halle or Holahan.
