Connecticut Democrat Chris Murphy has remained silent on rumors that he is seeing a former Democratic political strategist who now runs a media network backed by George Soros under the guise of independent news.
Photos surfaced of Murphy enjoying a quiet dinner with Tara McGowan, publisher and founder of Courier Newsroom, a liberal media organization that has taken millions of dollars in support from liberal megadonors like George Soros. McGowan and Murphy recently announced their separation after nearly twenty years of marriage.
News headlinesOn Capitol Hill, Forever Digital recently questioned Murphy over his ties to McGowan.
“I refuse to discuss that,” Murphy replied.
McGowan has deep Democratic Party roots; he was an aide on Obama’s re-election campaign and later had leadership roles at the Democratic super PAC Priorities Action USA and the Democratic digital advocacy group ACRONYM.
The left-leaning media outlet Courier Newsroom was formed by the strategist with ties to Murphy; it has received millions of dollars from Soros’s lobbying group, the Fund for Policy Reform.
“The Washington correspondent for NewsGuard, a New York-based nonpartisan organization that reviews news sites to combat misinformation,” wrote Gabby Deutch in an op-ed that The Washington Post referred to in 2021. In the piece, Deutch criticized Courier Newsroom as a “political operation” that is “exploiting the widespread loss of local journalism to create and disseminate something we really don’t need: hyperlocal partisan propaganda.”
According to HeadlinesForever Digital’s past reporting, the Courier Newsroom received three grants totaling $5 million from the Fund for Policy Reform in 2021 and 2022. The grants were given to “support its non-partisan journalism, which aims to further the common good and general welfare of U.S. communities by providing access to information,” according to the grant database.
By April of 2024, McGowan had also worked closely with the government of former president Joe Biden, visiting the Biden White House around twenty times.
Murphy and McGowan were seen getting close at a bar in Washington, D.C. earlier this month, as reported by the New York Post. An insider told the publication that the two were becoming “cutesy.”
According to the source, Murphy and his wife, Cathy Holahan, a lawyer from Washington, D.C., are still married and have not initiated divorce proceedings in either Connecticut or the nation’s capital. Following Murphy’s re-election in November, the pair did indeed announce their separation.
People are wondering if Murphy is interested in running for president in the future since he has established himself as a leading adversary of President Trump on the Democratic side.
A recent headline in the New York Times said, “Chris Murphy Emerges as a Clear Voice for Democrats Countering Trump,” which was accompanied by an item that was reprinted on Murphy’s website.