Few believe the Arizona senator’s claim to have been ‘shocked’ by allegations against his ‘closest friend in Congress’
Sen. Ruben Gallego (D., Ariz.) is taking heat after a sexual misconduct scandal forced his good friend, California Democrat Eric Swalwell, to suspend his campaign for governor and resign from Congress. “An important question everyone should be asking: what did Senator Ruben Gallego know and when did he know it?” journalist Yashar Ali wrote on X.
Gallego, who chaired Swalwell’s short-lived presidential campaign in 2020 and served alongside him in Congress for years, endorsed the congressman’s bid for governor on March 26. The Arizona Mirror described Swalwell as “one of Gallego’s closest friends in Congress.” In 2021, they took their spouses to Qatar on a luxury junket, met with terrorist-adjacent charity officials, and posed shirtless while riding camels in the desert.
Before abruptly withdrawing his endorsement last week—amid reports that Swalwell allegedly raped a former staffer and behaved inappropriately toward at least three other women—Gallego initially rode to his buddy’s defense.
“When you are in first place, is when they target you,” Gallego wrote on April 7 in response to reports that Swalwell would “soon” face credible accusations of sexual misconduct. “Eric is a fighter and he will win the Governors race.” Gallego also attacked the credibility of Democratic influencer Arielle Fodor, aka “Mrs. Frazzled,” who (accurately) predicted that the coming allegations would sink Swalwell’s campaign.
In a statement posted on April 10, Gallego claimed he was “shocked and upset” to learn of the accusations against his friend, and said he regretted defending him on social media “prior to knowing all the information.” Since then, many have challenged Gallego’s suggestion that he was completely unaware of Swalwell’s alleged behavior toward women, which has been described as an “open secret” for more than a decade.
“I’ve covered Eric Swalwell since he was a member of the Dublin City Council,” wrote Bay Area writer Steven Tavares. “Shortly after being elected to Congress in 2013, his behavior towards women was known by all levels of our local government and the Alameda County Democratic Party.” Gallego became a congressman in 2015. Nearly three years later, a CNN article on sexual harassment in Congress referenced “more than half a dozen” Capitol Hill sources who “independently named one California congressman for pursuing female staffers.”
Swalwell married Brittany Watts, the mother of his three children, in 2016. The woman who alleged that Swalwell raped her was a former staffer on his presidential campaign—which Gallego chaired—in 2019, and worked in his congressional office until 2021. The woman’s account was detailed in a San Francisco Chronicle report that Gallego cited in the statement withdrawing his endorsement of Swalwell.
Gallego’s bromantic relationship with Swalwell isn’t just raising questions about how much he may have known about his buddy’s atrocious behavior. The scandal has also increased scrutiny of Gallego’s own not-so-wholesome personal life. Gallego divorced his first wife, Phoenix mayor Kate Gallego, less than a year after joining Swalwell in Congress. He filed for forced divorce when she was nine months pregnant and “likely to give birth any day.” He described the marriage as “irretrievably broken”—a claim his wife disputed—and demanded that his wife cover his attorney’s fees. The details only came to light in 2024 after the Washington Free Beacon successfully sued to have the records unsealed.
Gallego claims to have met his second wife, real estate lobbyist Sydney Barron, a little over a year after his divorce was finalized. He was 39 at the time; she was 25. There is reason to doubt Gallego’s account of the timeline. He wrote in his book, They Called Us “Lucky,” that the couple got engaged in February 2019. Records show they were legally married in December that same year. Two months later, Gallego announced on social media that Barron had accepted his proposal. They held a wedding in Puerto Rico in 2021, according to Politico. The ceremony was officiated by Leigh Parker Pross, a defense industry lobbyist who introduced the couple while working as regional finance director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
Days before the Swalwell scandal broke, Gallego told NBC News he was seriously considering a presidential run in 2028.
UPDATE: Swalwell resigned from Congress on Monday. He vowed to take responsibility for his “mistakes,” but reiterated that the “serious” allegations against him were “false.” In a statement, Gallego said Swalwell was “no longer fit” to serve and once again claimed to have had “no knowledge” of his former colleague’s scandalous behavior. “I trusted someone who I believed was a friend,” Gallego wrote, “but it is now clear that he is not the person I thought I knew.”
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