Credit: ABC
Rachael Kirkconnell
While Matt decided not to propose to Rachael during the final, which aired in March 2021, they left the show as a couple. The pair had secretly split, however, in February 2021 after she was accused of being racist and photos of her at an antebellum-themed party at a college plantation resurfaced. Rachael apologized for her actions twice via Instagram before sitting down with Matt and the guest host Emmanuel Acho long After the Final Rose.
“When he first called me to end things, my initial reaction was that I was very confused. I was so blind,” Rachael said in the special. “But once that initial reaction went away, I thought, you know, how strong I thought our relationship was. So for him to end things, for example, he must have been very, very hurt by everything. It was difficult because I lost the love of my life.”
After being spotted together in April 2021, Matt and Rachael confirmed to May that they were giving their romance another shot. The pair exclusively revealed us in July 2023 that they are used to speculation about their separation again.
“I think we’ve been through so much at this point that nothing really gets us up to speed. I get it — because we’re together a lot, so whenever our schedules don’t match up or whenever we have our own things going on, I get where people are coming from,” Rachael said.
Matt, for his part, admitted that even his mother is prone to worry about the status of their relationship.
“I’ll come home and if Rachael’s not with me, my mom’s like, ‘What’s wrong? Where’s Rachael?” he said us. “I’m like, ‘She had to go home to see her family!’ She has her mom, dad, brother and sister (in Atlanta).
