Eric Swalwell's donor-funded congressional campaigns racked up more than 100 separate charges with now-defunct alcohol delivery service Drizly over a four-year period starting in 2020, federal campaign disclosures reveal, a spending spree that accounted for roughly a quarter of all payments to Drizly from every candidate campaign, political committee, and PAC in the country since 2019.
That figure comes from Federal Election Commission data, as the New York Post reported. The former California congressman, once a leading Democrat in the race for governor before his political career collapsed under sexual misconduct allegations, didn't stop when Drizly folded into Uber Eats in early 2024. His campaigns then used Uber Eats more than 220 times, running up charges exceeding $19,000. Those Uber Eats records don't specify whether the purchases were food, alcohol, or both.
The sheer volume of booze-delivery charges, the Las Vegas hotel bills, the steakhouse tabs, and the nearly $219,000 Swalwell paid himself from campaign funds for childcare, security, and other expenses since 2021 paint a picture of a congressman treating his donors' money like a personal expense account.
Campaign records show a particularly striking cluster of spending in the summer of 2021, when Swalwell's tab totaling roughly $6,100 overlapped with multiple trips to Las Vegas. He appears to have visited the Cosmopolitan Las Vegas three times over a 10-day stretch, on July 9, 12, and 19.
The charges tell their own story. A $117.54 bill at STK Steakhouse. A $439.57 tab at Jean Georges Steakhouse at Aria. A $940.01 transaction at the Cosmopolitan on July 19 alone. All told, his time in Vegas over those 10 days cost donors more than $3,100.
This wasn't an isolated quarter of loose spending. Fox News reported in 2021 that FEC records showed Swalwell's campaign had spent over $10,000 on 26 limousine and luxury car rides in the second quarter of that year, along with more than $26,000 on luxury hotels, including over $20,000 at the Ritz-Carlton Half Moon Bay, where his wife had worked as director of sales.
The campaign also dropped $566 through Drizly, $1,151 at Capitol Hill Wine and Spirits, and more than $7,000 at luxury restaurants and steakhouses during that same period, Fox News found. As the outlet noted at the time, "While the payments to the wineries could have come from a campaign event, it is not clear that the seven charges at the Capitol Hill liquor store and nine Drizly charges were campaign related."
The Post's review of congressional campaign filings found 36 Drizly charges totaling $2,405 from May 2020 through the end of that year alone. The charges kept coming for four years, through the transition from Drizly to Uber Eats, and continued as recently as this year.
Newsmax reported that FEC records showed Swalwell spent more than $30,000 in campaign funds during a single fiscal quarter in 2021 on limousine rides, luxury restaurants, hotels, and alcohol delivery, including nearly $4,400 at two California wineries.
For context, Sen. Ruben Gallego, the next-highest Drizly spender the Post identified among elected officials, recorded 14 campaign charges with the alcohol delivery service worth $814 from 2022 to 2024. Swalwell's total dwarfed every comparable political account.
Loyola Law School professor Jessica Levinson told the Post that the volume of alcohol purchases raised serious questions. She said it was "absolutely fair" to scrutinize the spending:
"In this case, the sheer number of alcohol purchases can raise some questions about whether the campaign funds were being used for a proper purpose. Somebody should sort out whether these purchases fall within election laws."
Levinson drew a sharp line between personal spending and donor-funded campaigns:
"We're not talking about somebody spending their own money. We're talking about somebody spending donors' money."
Alex Evans, Swalwell's former chief of staff, offered a blunt assessment. Evans told the California Post that the spending "might not be the best use of donor money", then went further.
"He knew exactly what he was doing. He created a bodyguard of lies to protect himself and allow this behavior to continue."
Evans added: "He's one of the world's greatest liars ever." That's not an opposition researcher or a Republican rival talking. That's the man who ran Swalwell's congressional office.
The spending questions come on top of separate filings showing Swalwell paid himself almost $219,000 in campaign funds for childcare, security, and other expenses since 2021. A new filing on Friday listed Swalwell as his own congressional campaign's treasurer. And separate Post reporting found that Swalwell spent more than $75,000 from his defunct congressional campaign in the first quarter of 2026, after dropping his re-election bid, on hotels, meals, rideshares, airfare, and childcare. Under campaign finance law, money raised for an abandoned bid can only go toward limited uses like winding down office expenses, contributing to other candidates, or donating to charity.
Swalwell's campaign finance habits are now just one thread in a rapidly unraveling political career. The former congressman, who had been the leading Democrat in California's governor's race, suspended his campaign and relinquished his seat in Congress after allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced.
Four women who spoke to CNN described a pattern of inappropriate and at times aggressive behavior by Swalwell in settings where alcohol was involved. A former staffer who spoke to the San Francisco Chronicle described an encounter in which she said Swalwell made unwanted physical advances after drinking and accused him of sexual assault.
Lonna Drewes, a 50-year-old model, accused Swalwell of rape following what she described as a night involving alcohol. She said she met Swalwell at events where he offered to help her business and later accompanied him to his hotel room, where she believes her drink was drugged. She alleged she became physically incapacitated and that Swalwell raped and choked her until she lost consciousness.
Swalwell has become the focus of investigations by the Department of Justice and district attorneys in New York and Los Angeles. He hired attorney Sara Azari and denied wrongdoing while apologizing to his wife and family for "personal failings."
Azari issued a statement calling the accusations "false, fabricated, and deeply offensive" and describing them as "a calculated and transparent political hit job designed to destroy the reputation of a man who has spent 20 years in public service." Meanwhile, Democratic leaders have offered little public response to the mounting allegations.
Prior Post reporting described Swalwell spending half a million dollars on hotels during his time in Congress. Separate allegations have surfaced about his use of campaign funds to pay a nanny, claims that, if true, would represent yet another category of potential misuse of donor money.
The alcohol delivery charges alone tell a damning story in raw numbers: more than 100 Drizly orders, then more than 220 Uber Eats charges. Roughly $6,100 in one Las Vegas stretch. Nearly $19,000 on Uber Eats after the booze app shut down. Almost $219,000 paid to himself. And all of it drawn from the wallets of donors who thought they were funding a congressman's campaign.
Swalwell has also been entangled in other legal disputes, including a lawsuit he quietly dropped against FHFA Director Pulte over a mortgage fraud referral, another episode that raised more questions than it answered about the former congressman's financial conduct.
Key gaps remain. The Uber Eats charges don't detail whether the purchases were for food, alcohol, or both. The specific filing dates and report periods behind some of the cited disclosures are unclear. And no public accounting has explained how $219,000 in self-payments for childcare, security, and "other expenses" squares with federal campaign finance rules.
Donors gave their money to elect a congressman. What they got instead was a man who, by his own former chief of staff's account, built a wall of deception to keep the tab running. That's not a campaign. That's a racket with a filing deadline.
