In 2013, reports surfaced that Maria Shriver was dating political consultant Matthew Dowd after the pair was spotted out together in Washington, D.C. Photos published by the Daily Mail showed the two walking out of a restaurant during a private dinner outing in Georgetown on October 19. Dowd is a former ABC News political analyst who’d served as Arnold Schwarzenegger’s chief strategist during his 2006 re-election campaign as California state governor. Sources later confirmed their romance to The Washington Post, saying that Shriver and Dowd had been “seriously” but “very quietly” seeing each other for the past few months. Less than a year after that initial outing, the two made their first public appearance as a couple at the wedding of Shriver’s cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to actor Cheryl Hines in 2014.
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Shortly after going public, rumors swirled surrounding the pair after the New York Post published a bombshell report claiming that Shriver and Dowd had an affair during his time working as a campaign strategist for Schwarzenegger. Sources cited by the publication claimed that the two would openly flirt with each other in front of other campaign staffers. “They frequently spent time alone,” a source said (via PageSix). “And Arnold was rarely, if ever, around when they were together.” Schwarzenegger eventually learned about the dalliance and swiftly dropped Dowd. However, Dowd, in a message to the Post, denied the allegations. “There was no affair,” he said. “We were good friends.” Per the Daily Mail, he and Shriver would ultimately call it quits in 2017 after four years together.
