A History of the Mayflower Hotel in 5 Scandals

Once again, the Mayflower Hotel is at the center of a political scandal.

On Tuesday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions told the Senate intelligence committee that he did not have any private meetings or recall any private conversations with Russian officials at an April 2016 event at the storied Washington hotel.

“Let me state this clearly: I have never met with or had any conversations with any Russians or any foreign officials concerning any type of interference with any campaign or election,” he said.

A Getty photo of Sessions speaking with a guest at the event while Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak stood nearby circulated on social media after Sessions’ remarks and “Mayflower Hotel” began trending on Twitter.

It wasn’t the first time that the hotel just north of the White House was the center of controversy. Here’s a quick look at other Mayflower-related scandals.

The Reported Second Home of an Alleged JFK Mistress

Mafia liaison Judith Exner, who claimed in People magazine in the 1980s that she had had an affair with President John F. Kennedy, is believed to have kept a room at the hotel.

Marion S. Barry, Jr. Found Guilty of Possessing Crack

In 1990, a jury found the former mayor of the District of Columbia guilty of possessing cocaine at the Mayflower in the fall of 1989, and Barry served six months in prison. A year later, a federal sting operation famously caught him smoking a crack pipe with a former model Rasheeda Moore at the Vista, a different hotel in the city (now known as the Westin City Center).

Bill Clinton Hugs Monica Lewinsky

More than a year before the news outlets started reporting on the affair between Monica Lewinsky and President Bill Clinton, the leader is seen embracing his former White House intern as he works a rope line at the hotel. She stayed at the hotel while the scandal unfolded, and stayed in the presidential suite while she filmed a deposition there, according to Keith McClinsey’s biography Washington D.C.’s Mayflower Hotel.

Eliot Spitzer’s Meeting With a Prostitute

A March 10, 2008, a New York Times investigation revealed that the New York Governor was the “Client 9” who met Ashley Dupre of a high-profile prostitution ring known as The Emperor’s Club in room 871 of the Mayflower. He resigned two days later, and no federal criminal charges were filed against him.

Donald Trump’s Foreign Policy Campaign Speech

The real estate mogul gave a major speech on his vision for U.S. foreign policy during the 2016 presidential campaign at the hotel on April 27, 2016, in which he declared that “the horrible cycle of hostility must end” between Russia and the U.S. Today, the event is remembered more as a possible site for another pro-Russia statement, where Sessions and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner allegedly met with Kislyak, according to a conversation intercepted by American intelligence officials in which Kislyak is said to be discussing this private meeting.