Chris Harrison pissed off a good portion of Bachelor Nation this week when he spoiled this season of The Bachelor by announcing the next Bachelorette on Jimmy Kimmel Live! While everyone is thrilled that the beautiful, smart, funny Rachel Lindsay will become the first Black Bachelorette, people are also annoyed that they now know Rachel doesn't end up with Nick — with an entire month left of the show yet to air. "You would've thought I started the next world war with the response," Harrison said on Live With Kelly Friday morning.
Harrison did his best to defend ABC's unpopular decision. Basically, it's all about timing — and finding the perfect guy for Rachel. "We named her the Bachelorette early because weird TV calendar stuff is that The Bachelor runs right up to when we start taping The Bachelorette," he said. "Like, we’re talking days."
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He continued, "We’re like, ‘Well, we need to let everybody know that Rachel’s our Bachelorette. We would like to cast the show for her.’ We cast all year long, but like we did with Nick...we wanted everyone to know it’s Nick so we can find people that really want to be with Nick. And so we want to cast the show for Rachel, but we can’t do that in two days."
We adore Rachel, so we totally support the choice to do whatever necessary to get the absolute best pool of guys for her. She deserves it — and you're off the hook, Chris.