Mayor Muriel Bowser is no stranger to bad optics, but this time, it’s not just incompetence—it’s a full-blown ethics scandal. The Democrat mayor of Washington, D.C., is facing mounting backlash after a months-long 7News I-Team investigation revealed she accepted over $60,000 in travel funding from the Qatari government—without disclosure, approval, or any apparent accountability.
The trip to Doha, Qatar in 2023 wasn’t exactly a backpacking excursion. It included Bowser and four senior staffers, all on the Qatari dime, and it conveniently rolled into a side trip to Dubai for a UN Climate Change Conference. The total cost? A cool $61,930. And none of it—none—was properly disclosed to D.C. taxpayers or recorded in official channels, as required by city law and Bowser’s own ethics memo. Yes, the one she wrote.
Bowser’s office tried to cover its tracks with a series of ever-changing explanations. First, her Communications Director claimed the D.C. Chamber of Commerce paid for it. When that lie got exposed, she pivoted to the U.S. Conference of Mayors. That didn’t hold up either. The truth finally emerged through a FOIA request: Qatar footed the bill as an “in-kind donation,” and the Mayor’s legal team scrambled to clean it up—over a year later.
To make matters worse, Bowser’s Chief of Staff, Lindsey Parker, submitted a taxpayer-funded hotel receipt from the lavish Atlantis Palm Hotel in Dubai—$3,500 for a three-night stay. And yes, she was one of the officials on the Qatar junket. So not only was the foreign donation unreported, but taxpayers got stuck with part of the tab anyway.
When 7News reporter Scott Taylor asked Bowser why her 2022 Miami and 2023 Dubai trips were missing from financial disclosures, she completely dodged the question, saying she was only discussing the “inaugural” that day. Classic politician evasion.
Behind the scenes, it was panic mode. Internal emails show city lawyers reaching out to the Qatari government as recently as February 2025—over a year after the trip—desperately requesting an expense breakdown so they could file the proper paperwork after the fact. That’s not transparency. That’s a cover-up in slow motion.
To date, Bowser’s office still refuses to answer basic questions. Who paid for the other luxury trips? Were there any business deals made in Qatar? Is there an ethics investigation underway? D.C.’s mayor has some serious explaining to do—and it’s long overdue.
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