The Most Expensive Political Divorces

The normalization of divorce, even among political figures, may have removed much of its antiquated moral stigmas, but it hasn't made it any less expensive. The first divorced person to be elected U.S. president was Ronald Reagan, who had divorced actor Jane Wyman decades before becoming president. Ironically, this conservative hero was also the one to sign the country's very first no-fault divorce law, back when he was the governor of California in 1969. Since then, and the subsequent passage of similar laws throughout other states, divorce has become much more common and politically normal. Current President Donald Trump is twice divorced (so far), and it's even more common internationally, with current presidents Xi Jinping of China, Vladimir Putin of Russia, and Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo of Mexico all having been divorced.

The cost of divorce varies greatly depending on whether it's contested or uncontested, if children and custody are involved, where the divorce occurs, and, of course, the amount of wealth involved. Forbes reports the median cost of divorce in America as being $7,000, while the average is around $15,000. Hollywood divorces can be egregiously expensive. The most expensive divorces involve corporate overlords like Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos, where billions of dollars are at stake. Nonetheless, in the world of politics, hundreds of millions of dollars continue to exchange hands through divorce settlements, with no sign of slowing down.

There are quite a few things we don't know about Vladimir Putin. Like other details of the Russian president's life, his divorce from Lyudmila Shkrebneva was shrouded in secrecy. The two began dating in 1979 before marrying in 1983. Lyudmila avoided the spotlight over the next three decades of their marriage as Putin became more powerful. The pair divorced in 2014 after having supposedly been estranged for years; "Our marriage is over," Lyudmila said (per Deutsche Welle), "due to the fact that we barely see each other. Vladimir Vladimirovich is completely submerged in his work. Our children have grown up, each of them is living her own life ... And I truly don't like publicity."

Since then, Putin is said to have had different alleged relationships (former Miss Russia Victoria Lopyreva and Olympic gymnast Alina Kabaeva) but has not remarried. However, Putin has allegedly been financially involved in the next marriage of his ex-wife. Lyudmila Ocheretnaya, as she's now known, married Artur Ocheretny, and it seems like Putin provided a "dowry" of sorts. "In the old times it was common for a bride's parents to arrange a dowry," wrote Maria Pevchikh, head of the Anti-Corruption Foundation established by the late Alexei Navalny, on X (formerly Twitter). "But Putin took a whole new approach. He literally arranged a multi-million-dollar dowry for his ex-wife." This seems to include millions of dollars in international real estate, likely as a way to get around sanctions imposed against Putin and Russians.

Most divorces are hardly as secretive as Putin's, especially when you're in the U.S. government and you need to report all financial statements. This is the case with former Vermont governor Peter Shumlin and his divorce from Deborah Shumlin, which was finalized on March 18, 2013, 24 years after their wedding. "Even though divorce is a sad occasion, Deb and I will be forever blessed by many extraordinary years together and two remarkable daughters," read a statement released by Shumlin (via VT Digger). "Deb and I are grateful that we remain friends and will continue to share our strong family." They would also share a house and property in Nova Scotia, and things get more expensive from there. In the divorce settlement, Shumlin surrendered a $444,000 home, $10,000 a month in spousal support for life, and another $3 million to his ex-wife.

While not reported at the time, Shumlin had apparently been seeing another, much younger woman for multiple years. Katie Hunt is 28 years younger than Shumlin, and the pair were married in 2015, just two years after his divorce from Deborah; he was 59 and she was 31. The news came just a few months after announcing that he would not run for governor again. This was actually the third marriage for Peter Shumlin, who married his first wife, Elizabeth Preston Parsons, in 1981, when he was just 25. The third time's the charm, it seems.

Former New York City mayor and associate attorney general Rudy Giuliani is yet another multiple divorcé, with three ex-wives costing him different amounts of money. His first marriage was with his second cousin, Regina Peruggi, from 1968 to 1982, and it doesn't seem like their annulment involved much money. His second divorce was with Donna Hanover after 15 years, and that was a much messier affair — and more expensive. It began when Giuliani announced the divorce during a press conference, something which came as a shock to Hanover, with whom he hadn't discussed this move whatsoever. After 18 months of legal battles, they reached a settlement that paid Hanover $6.8 million (without tax), unspecified child support, and an apartment on the Upper East Side.

Giuliani and his third wife, Judith Nathan, fought through a very public divorce after 16 years. "The man that he is now is absolutely not the man he was when I married him," Nathan told New York Magazine. "For a variety of reasons that I know as a spouse and a nurse, he has become a different man." The terms of that settlement were confidential, but things blew up in 2022 with a brutal new lawsuit from Nathan claiming Giuliani still owed her $260,000. He skipped a court hearing for this and was found in contempt, being threatened with jail time. It's yet another example of the sad reality that Giuliani's life had become.

It sometimes seems as if Rudy Giuliani's pal Donald Trump has had a dozen divorces, but he's actually just had two — Ivana Zelníčková in 1990, and Marla Maples in 1999. They've nonetheless been expensive ones, with his first divorce becoming a tabloid sensation at the time and costing Trump more than a reported $14 million (or $33 million, adjusted for inflation). Citing cruel and inhuman treatment in the divorce, Ivana also got Trump's 45-room mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut, a Trump Plaza apartment in New York City, and the use of Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida for one month of each year. She also managed to get $650,000 annually in child support for the three children they shared.

That is certainly a lot of money, but Ivana actually wanted more. The thing is, Trump just didn't have it (and arguably couldn't even afford this settlement). Like many people, Ivana thought that Trump was a billionaire, with her and her lawyers valuing Trump's assets at $5 billion. Turns out, that was a fancy illusion, with Trump's businesses having recently declared bankruptcy, finding himself in debt. When Marla Maples and Trump divorced, things were much simpler thanks to a restrictive prenuptial agreement, which designated $2 million to Maples. The prenup also reportedly guaranteed child support for Tiffany Trump through the age of 21, with Maples raising Tiffany on the West Coast in California while the other Trumps stayed in New York City.

If any single modern politician is known for their debauchery and scandal-plagued private life, it's probably three-time Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who was married and divorced twice before wisely settling on "domestic partners" instead of marriage. While it's unclear what kind of settlement, if any, ended his divorce with first wife Carla Dall'Oglio, it was the court ruling over Berlusconi's second divorce that broke the bank for the hard-partying PM. The infamous Italian media mogul split from his wife of 22 years, Veronica Lario, in 2009, and the court ruled in December 2012. Berlusconi was ordered to pay his ex-wife $4 million a month in alimony, according to the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera (via Al Jazeera). That's more than $130 thousand a day. This amount was eventually cut down to $1.7 million a month.

However, the tables turned five years later after the top appeals court in Italy ruled that one's standard of living while married no longer needed to be guaranteed in a divorce settlement. As such, the courts found that Berlusconi was treated unfairly and Lario was ordered to return $60 million to her ex-husband. When Berlusconi died at the age of 86, he left $117 million to his 33-year-old girlfriend and $35 million to a mafia-linked associate, but nothing more for Veronica.

Another womanizing European leader, Andreas Papandreou, served three terms as the prime minister of Greece and had three marriages to boot. After his first wife, Catherine, Papandreou married Margaret in 1951, until filing for divorce in 1989. He had fallen head over heels for another woman and wanted to marry her, so he sued for divorce after loosening laws surrounding divorce earlier in the decade. Papandreou's friend and the owner of the Bank of Crete managed much of Andreas' spending (especially behind the scenes, resulting in a massive $200 million scandal). He told Time that Margaret wanted an alleged settlement of $100 million, something she has denied; he "put together $10 million to $20 million as a start." It's unclear whether Papandreou paid out the entire $100 million or not.

Perhaps more interesting was Andreas Papandreou's will, which served as a massive middle finger to Margaret and his family. After dying in 1996, the Greek politician's will left literally everything to his newest wife, 41-year-old former flight attendant Dimitra "Mimi" Liani-Papandreou, leaving absolutely nothing for Margaret, the four children he had with her, or his illegitimate daughter. Call it a kind of payback, without paying anything.

Just like Ronald Reagan, the father of all-American no-fault divorce, Arnold Schwarzenegger was a successful actor who transitioned to California politics. In 2011, near the end of his time as the 38th governor of California, "The Governator" was involved in an affair with his maid at the time, Mildred Baena. That news, along with the fact that he had fathered a son with Mildred, became a tabloid sensation and swiftly ended Schwarzenegger's 25 years of marriage with Maria Shriver, though it was a divorce in slow-motion. Separating in 2011, it took Schwarzenegger and Shriver 10 years to finalize the divorce, with the delay blamed on a complex property settlement, lack of motivation, and the absence of a prenup.

The divorce settlement was essentially a 50/50 split, combining the net worth of Schwarzenegger and Shriver, with the latter getting half of everything (all of which was valued at roughly $400 million at the time). The settlement also stipulates that she will receive the entirety of the value if Schwarzenegger dies before her and grants her 50% of his Screen Actors Guild retirement plan, according to documents obtained by RadarOnline. Despite the massive amount of money and betrayal involved, Schwarzenegger and Shriver are on surprisingly good terms with each other. Much of this is due to Schwarzenegger's genuine shame, remorse, and desire to make things "right," something he has detailed in interviews and in his book, "Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story."

When it comes to the most expensive divorces, Russian oligarchs are hard to beat. Farkhad Akhmedov is an Azerbaijani-Russian oil and gas billionaire who served as a representative in the Russian Senate, the Federation Council. Between 2007 and 2010, he was a member of the Russian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. Akhmedov married Tatiana Akhmedova in 1993 before moving to London, where she raised their two children. They separated in 2014, and a divorce settlement awarded Tatiana £450 million ($613 million) in 2016.

However, Tatiana was unable to receive a dime of this divorce money after Farkhad fled to Russia, refusing to respond to court dates and legal filings. He claimed that the divorce was illegitimate, writing in a WhatsApp message to his son, "I will burn this moneys [sic] rather then will give her" (per Bloomberg). After five years of legal battles (essentially seizing Farkhad's beloved 377-foot-long superyacht in the process), the billionaire relented — kind of. He agreed to pay $186 million (more than $100 million of which went to Tatiana's legal team) in 2021. Ironically, after recovering his yacht, it was seized by the European Union when sanctions were applied to Akhmedov in 2022. The sanctions were lifted in September 2023 for whatever reason, though.

Like many other Russian oligarchs, Roman Abramovich made his initial fortune among the privatizing chaos and corruption of the '90s during the first post-Soviet years. The former Governor of Chukotka, an autonomous zone in eastern Russia, Abramovich held stakes in numerous industries, even owning the Premier League club Chelsea at one point. He has also had three marriages and three divorces, and they all add up to a staggering amount of money.

After divorcing Olga Yurevna Lysova in 1990 with an undisclosed settlement, Abramovich married Irina Malandina in 1991. They divorced in 2007, and there was wide media speculation that a billion-dollar settlement was coming. In actuality, Malandina received $300 million. Abramovich quickly married the 27-year-old Dasha Zhukova in 2008, and they divorced in 2017. All the details of their settlement haven't been publicly disclosed, though there was a lucrative property settlement that awarded Zhukova six New York City properties on the Upper East Side, worth a total of $92.3 million. Zhukova is independently wealthy as the daughter of an oil magnate, so it's doubtful that Abramovich would've had to pay as much as he did with Malandina; however, he and Zhukova had two children together, so perhaps there are steep alimony payments.

Boris Berezovsky was yet another Russian oligarch who dabbled in politics, having been the former Deputy Secretary in charge of Chechnya and executive secretary of the Commonwealth of Independent States. In fact, Berezovsky was a former close friend of the aforementioned Roman Abramovich, a friendship that disintegrated during legal battles between them (which Abramovich won). Berezovsky, who had control over the popular Channel One on Russian television, divorced his first wife in 1991, the same year he married Galina Besharova. They divorced in 2010. The pair were reportedly together for only two years, with Berezovsky spending the remaining 16 years of his marriage living with a different partner, Yelena Gorbunova.

Admitting "unreasonable behavior," Berezovsky agreed to a settlement with Besharova, breaking the record for the most expensive divorce at the time. Besharova received cash, stocks and shares, and a London penthouse, assets which were all worth £220 million at the time (more than $400 million adjusted for inflation), according to The Telegraph. This far exceeded the £100 million that was expected at the time. While Berezovsky was amicable, the cost of the divorce, combined with losing legal battles with Abramovich, left the man increasingly destitute while he was in exile in England. Two years after the divorce, he was found dead in what was initially ruled a suicide but later became an open verdict after an inquest led to some confusion and contradictions. Berezovsky was a critic of Putin's and had previously been the target of assassination attempts.

While Boris Berezovsky held the record for the most expensive political divorce for several years, it wouldn't be long before others caught up to him. While people outside of politics have had more expensive divorces — Bill Gates' divorce cost him $76 billion, for instance — Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum has had the costliest in the political realm. The ruler of Dubai, and thus the prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, Mohammed, has been married to at least six women. However, detailed information is known about only one of his divorces, the one that was publicly litigated in an international court.

In 2004, Mohammed married Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein, King Hussein of Jordan's daughter, and they were divorced in 2019. British courts awarded her more than $730 million in the settlement, which included an upfront payment of $333 million and a bank guarantee of $390 million. The total settlement is expected to increase over time, with the sheikh ordered to pay annually for the security of his two children with Haya. The scale of the ruling comes from Haya stating that she was in fear for her life, having fled Dubai with her children in 2019, according to the BBC. She received frequent threats, and it was confirmed that Mohammed had ordered the hacking of her and her lawyers' phones. In this and many other cases, divorce may have saved her life.