Bachelor’s Arie Luyendyk Jr. is facing backlash after joking that his fiancée, Lauren Burnham, is pregnant in an April Fools’ day prank.
On Sunday, April 1, the race car driver posted a photo of a woman in a maroon dress cradling a baby bump with the caption: “Secrets finally out, we have a bunny in the oven! @laurenburnham91.”
His tweet came just days after the couple celebrated Lauren moving to his native Arizona to live with the former bachelor.
Arie followed up his tweet on Sunday with “APRIL FOOLS!” causing a bevy of his followers to bash him for joking about pregnancy.
“You both are disgusting. As someone who struggles with fertility and would love nothing more than to have a baby this is so offensive,” one social media user wrote, while another added: “Come on. be better than that. it’s not a joke for many struggling families to get pregnant, it’s extremely expensive and it’s heartbreaking. I wish nothing but the best for Arie and Lauren but this is not funny, it’s cruel.”
Others came with facts to back up their disapproval, revealing that 12.1% percent of women between the ages of 15 to 44 struggle with infertility and find it difficult to conceive naturally.
The couple have already been dubbed the “most-hated couple” in Bachelor history since breaking the hearts of Bachelor nation after Arie dumped former fiancée Becca live on national TV during the devastatingly raw unedited season 22 finale.
As previously reported, Arie met up with Becca a couple weeks after getting engaged during the finale and Becca assumed they were going to spend the weekend together, but unbeknownst to her, Arie had previously told host Chris Harrison that he’s still in love with runner-up Lauren, whom he’s now engaged to, and that he needed to call things off with Becca.
He then proposed to Lauren during the After the Final Rose finale and Becca was crowned the next Bachelorette.
UPDATE: Arie has since apologized for the prank. He tweeted on Monday: