Anosh Ahmed gave Paxton $190,000, including $25,000 days after his July 2024 indictment, five months before the two rang in 2025 on the same Dubai balcony

Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general running for the US Senate, rang in 2025 on a crowded Dubai balcony beside two men who had been indicted five months earlier on federal charges of stealing more than $15 million from a Chicago safety-net hospital and who had not returned to the United States to face those charges. One of them, the former hospital executive Anosh Ahmed, had given Paxton $190,000, including $25,000 in the days after the indictment. Video of the party surfaced three weeks before the 3 November election, and Paxton, who survived impeachment in 2023 and a nine-year securities fraud prosecution, has not said who paid for the trip or whether he knew the two men were under indictment.

The Dubai gathering and $190,000 in campaign contributions

The Wall Street Journal revealed the gathering on 12 October 2026, three weeks before Paxton, the Republican nominee, faces voters in a race in which polls show him narrowly trailing. Its account rests on video shot by another guest as fireworks burst over the Burj Khalifa to mark the new year, on court filings and on people familiar with the event.

Ahmed, Loretto Hospital's former chief financial officer, and Sameer Suhail, a physician whose medical supply companies sold to the hospital, were charged by a federal grand jury in Chicago in July 2024. Ahmed was later accused of a separate scheme in which he is alleged to have billed the federal government for hundreds of millions of dollars in COVID-19 tests that were never performed. Both men have pleaded not guilty, and neither has been convicted.

Tracy Duhon, the Louisiana Christian author Paxton has dated since 2024, stood beside him as the fireworks went off. Paxton remains married to Angela Paxton, a Texas state senator who filed for divorce in July 2025.

Nick Maddux, a senior adviser to Paxton, did not address the trip when asked about it. He described Paxton instead as a target of years of political persecution whom voters keep returning to office. As of 13 October, Paxton and his campaign had not publicly said who organised or paid for the trip, who hosted the party, whether state security officers travelled with him or whether he knew the two men were under indictment.

The two men facing federal fraud charges

Anosh Ahmed, 42, served as Loretto's chief financial officer and chief operating officer until March 2021. He resigned after reports that the safety-net hospital on Chicago's West Side had given scarce COVID-19 vaccines to workers at Trump Tower in Chicago, where he owned a condo, and at a Gold Coast watch shop he frequented, instead of to residents of the Austin neighbourhood it serves. He is from Houston.

Federal prosecutors say Ahmed left Chicago for France and Dubai in August 2023 after learning of the investigation. His lawyers deny he was a fugitive and have said in court filings that he was abroad when he was first indicted and that family health problems delayed his return.

Sameer Suhail, 48, is a Chicago physician who owned medical supply companies that did business with Loretto. Foresight Health, a company he founded in February 2022, had pledged to reopen a shuttered hospital in Patrick County, Virginia, and later withdrew after residents raised concerns about the federal investigation. His lawyer, Adam Sheppard, has said Suhail travelled abroad before he was indicted.

Federal court records describe the case against both men as delayed by their status as fugitives, a status that covered the date of the Dubai party.

Serbian authorities arrested Ahmed on 30 November 2025 on an Interpol Red Notice, according to a prosecution filing dated 28 January 2026. A Serbian court refused on 30 December 2025 to release him to a hotel in Belgrade, and US officials filed their extradition request on 23 January 2026. Ahmed stopped fighting extradition in summer 2026, appeared in custody in Chicago on 28 August with Dan Webb, a former US Attorney in Chicago, and pleaded not guilty to a 15-count indictment on 31 August. He is held at the Metropolitan Correctional Center.

Suhail flew from Dubai to O'Hare International Airport on 21 April 2026 and was taken into custody at about 4 pm. On 22 April Sheppard entered a not guilty plea, and Magistrate Judge Beth Jantz released him on a $5 million bond to home confinement. Sheppard said civil matters in Dubai had kept Suhail from travelling after the indictment and that he returned voluntarily once they were resolved. Prosecutors said in August 2026 that they were working toward a plea agreement with him.

Ahmed's political donations and financial relationships

Ahmed's contributions to Paxton began in 2022 and totalled $190,000, according to campaign finance records. One of them, for $25,000, arrived days after the July 2024 indictment, which would place it after the charges were public and roughly five months before the Dubai party. Paxton's campaign has not said whether it returned any of the money.

Aaron Reitz, Paxton's former deputy attorney general for legal strategy and his endorsed choice to succeed him, reported receiving $99,894.26 from Ahmed on 30 June 2025 and listed Ahmed's address as Dubai. Reitz defended taking money from donors facing charges and wrote on X that "you can indict a ham sandwich." He finished fourth in the 3 March 2026 Republican primary for attorney general with 14 per cent of the vote.

A press release dated 9 July 2025 described Ahmed as a proud Republican and founder of the Anosh Supports America First Foundation, pledged aid to victims of that month's Texas floods and announced a "Texas Strong: America First Gala" in Dallas. Whether the gala took place, and whether Paxton had any part in it, has not been reported.

Houston holds most of Ahmed's Texas business interests. He owned Sekai, a Houston day club and nightclub, and as of July 2025 he was being sued in Texas by the uniform company Cintas for about $171,000 over unpaid services there and by American Express for about $120,000 in unpaid card charges. Federal prosecutors were seeking, as of July 2025, to seize a Houston house that one of his companies had transferred to a relative.

Ahmed promoted a venture called the Private Family Office of Anosh Ahmed, which claimed $1.5 billion under management and offices in Dubai, London, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the United States. No registration for it could be found in the United Arab Emirates, Texas or Illinois.

Heather Bergdahl, Loretto's former chief transformation officer and a co-defendant who is also from Houston, was arrested in Houston while boarding a private jet to join Ahmed in Dubai. She accepted a plea agreement in July 2026.

The Loretto Hospital and COVID-19 fraud allegations

Grand jurors charged Ahmed in July 2024 with eight counts of wire fraud, four counts of embezzlement, 11 counts of aiding and abetting embezzlement and three counts of money laundering. Prosecutors allege that Ahmed, Suhail and Bergdahl moved more than $15 million out of Loretto between 2018 and 2022 through invoices for goods and services the hospital never received. Suhail faces six counts of wire fraud, six counts of aiding and abetting embezzlement, a kickback conspiracy count and two counts of money laundering.

Prosecutors filed a superseding indictment in October 2024 alleging that Ahmed and George Miller, Loretto's former chief executive, steered at least $19 million in no-bid contracts to entities linked to Suhail and that Suhail paid Miller more than $750,000 in bribes. The indictment added tax charges against Ahmed. Miller reached a deal in August 2026 under which his indictment will be dismissed if he meets its conditions.

A second grand jury accused Ahmed in June 2025 of using personal data for about 150,000 former Loretto patients to bill the federal government for COVID-19 tests that were never performed. That indictment alleged false claims of about $894.5 million and payments of about $293.2 million. The bogus testing was routed through laboratories in Texas and Chicago, according to reporting on the indictment. Mohamed Sirajudeen, a Chicago lab owner charged alongside Ahmed, pleaded guilty on 5 August 2026 to conspiring with him.

Sheri Mecklenburg, the assistant US attorney who handled the Ahmed prosecutions, was accused in 2026 of misconduct before the grand jury in the collapsed "Broadview Six" case against protesters, and similar allegations surfaced in the testing case. In June 2026 the office of US Attorney Andrew Boutros avoided an evidentiary hearing before US District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman by having charges against two of Ahmed's co-defendants dismissed with prejudice.

A new grand jury re-indicted Ahmed in the testing case on 27 August 2026, alleging a loss of roughly $200 million. Coleman presides over that case and Judge Robert Gettleman over the embezzlement case. Neither Ahmed nor Suhail has been convicted of any offence.

The Dubai connections, travel arrangements

Ahmed and Suhail are business partners, friends and neighbours, and both were living in Dubai at the time of the party. The party was held in a luxury high-rise with a view of the Burj Khalifa, on a balcony full of people. Four of them have been identified: Paxton, Duhon, Ahmed and Suhail. The host and the owner of the apartment have not been identified.

The guest who recorded the video has not been named. The footage was cited in a filing in a Texas civil case in which that guest is a defendant. The case number, court and parties have not been made public.

State records show security officers accompanied Paxton on 19 foreign trips from 2022 through 2025, more than either the governor or the lieutenant governor, but those records do not include Dubai. The records are incomplete, so the absence leaves open whether Paxton travelled without his state detail, paid for security privately or took a trip the records did not capture.

Paxton's annual personal financial statement to the Texas Ethics Commission must report gifts of travel, lodging and entertainment above set thresholds. Paxton has not said whether his statement covering 2024 lists the Dubai trip or who paid for it.

Paxton's office runs the state's Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and its consumer protection division. The office has not disclosed any case involving Ahmed, Suhail or their companies, and no reported evidence links Ahmed's donations to any official action.

Paxton's previous corruption investigations and financial controversies

A Collin County grand jury indicted Paxton in July 2015 on two counts of first-degree felony securities fraud, alleging that in 2011 he steered investors to Servergy, a technology company, without disclosing that he would be paid in shares. The US Securities and Exchange Commission brought a parallel civil case that a federal judge dismissed in 2017. Paxton resolved the criminal case in March 2024 by agreeing to pay about $300,000 in restitution and perform community service, and the charges were dropped.

Paxton accepted $100,000 in 2015 from a former client whose company his office was investigating, part of more than $329,000 in gifts toward his legal defence that year. A bribery investigation into that gift closed without a finding of wrongdoing.

Nate Paul, an Austin real estate developer and Paxton donor, is at the centre of the most serious allegations. In 2020 eight senior aides reported Paxton to the FBI, alleging that he had used his office to help Paul fight a charity lawsuit, delay foreclosures and interfere with a federal investigation, and that Paul had hired a woman with whom Paxton was having an affair and paid for renovations to his Austin home. Paxton denied the allegations.

The Texas House impeached Paxton on 27 May 2023 on 20 articles including bribery and abuse of office, by a vote of 121 to 23. The Texas Senate acquitted him on every article in September 2023. The US Justice Department declined in late 2024 to bring charges, and Paul pleaded guilty in January 2025 to one count of making a false statement to a lender.

Four of the aides who reported Paxton sued under the Texas Whistleblower Act after he fired or pushed them out. A state judge ordered $6.6 million in damages in April 2025, and Paxton dropped his appeal that July, leaving taxpayers to pay.

Mortgage documents signed by the Paxtons listed three homes, one near Dallas and two in Austin, as their primary residence, and in 2018 they collected homestead tax breaks on two homes at once. An Oklahoma cabin worth about $1 million, bought in 2022, is missing from his state financial disclosure. Hunter Bonner, chair of the Marion County Republican Party, filed a mortgage fraud complaint with the Federal Housing Finance Agency on 21 September 2025, and no outcome has been reported.

Paxton's financial disclosure before his first race in 2002 listed assets worth less than $175,000. By 2018 he told a lender his net worth was about $5.5 million, not counting assets in a blind trust, and the Paxtons now own at least a dozen residential properties.

A $250,000 donation to Lone Star Liberty PAC, a super PAC backing Paxton, was filed under the name of a Plano entrepreneur who does not exist. The money came from Ben Pogue, whose father Trump pardoned in 2020 after a guilty plea to filing a false tax return. Pogue said the name was an inside joke with Paxton, and the PAC said it would correct the filing.

State security costs for Paxton's travel outside Texas reached at least $1.9 million, according to state reimbursement records.

The Senate election and political consequences

Donald Trump endorsed Paxton over the incumbent senator, John Cornyn, in a Truth Social post on 19 May 2026, a week before the Republican runoff. Trump wrote that Paxton "has gone through a lot, in many cases, very unfairly" and that he had "seen him tested at the highest and most difficult levels". He made the endorsement after being told that damaging revelations about Paxton were likely, according to people familiar with the conversations, and he brushed off the warning by predicting that more damaging material would emerge about the Democratic nominee. Paxton won the runoff on 26 May 2026. The Democratic nominee, state Representative James Talarico, holds a narrow lead in polls, and no Democrat has won a statewide race in Texas since 1994.

Talarico's campaign posted the Dubai video on X on 13 October and wrote that "the fugitives were charged with healthcare fraud and helped bankroll Paxton's campaign." Campaign finance records reported so far list donations from Ahmed and none from Suhail. The Senate Majority PAC, a Democratic group, also circulated the report.

Outstanding questions

Ken Paxton has not said who financed his Dubai trip, whether state security officers accompanied him, who hosted the gathering or what he knew about the federal indictments against Anosh Ahmed and Sameer Suhail. Paxton's 2024 personal financial statement filed with the Texas Ethics Commission, alongside campaign expenditure reports covering December 2024 and January 2025, could help establish whether he, a donor or another organisation paid for his travel and accommodation. Texas Department of Public Safety reimbursement records from the same period could clarify whether public funds covered security arrangements. The Texas civil filing that references the party video may identify the person who recorded it, the venue and other attendees.

Paxton's office has not publicly established whether it handled any matter involving Ahmed, Suhail, the Houston nightclub Sekai, Ahmed's property interests or the Texas laboratories implicated in the alleged COVID-19 testing fraud. Public information requests could clarify whether the attorney general's office opened, investigated, closed or declined any related matter. Further federal court filings in the Loretto Hospital cases may establish whether prosecutors examined the Dubai gathering or either man's contacts with Texas officials. Campaign finance records could also clarify whether Paxton's campaign returned any portion of Ahmed's reported $190,000 in contributions. No refund has been reported. Paxton has not said whether he knew the men were under indictment when he attended the gathering. Their charges had been public since July 2024, and Ahmed reportedly contributed $25,000 of that total within days of his indictment.

Ahmed in custody, Suhail in plea talks, early voting from 19 October

Ahmed remains in federal custody in Chicago awaiting trial in two fraud cases, and Suhail is confined to his home on a $5 million bond while prosecutors negotiate a plea agreement. Paxton's only response to questions about Dubai has been a campaign statement calling him a target of political persecution, and no refund of Ahmed's $190,000 has been reported. Paxton still runs the state office responsible for investigating fraud in Texas, and early voting in the race that will decide whether he moves to the US Senate opens on 19 October and closes on 30 October, ahead of polling day on 3 November.