Former Bachelor Colton Underwood Reveals That He Only Came Out Publicly Because He Was Blackmailed

We met Colton Underwood as a contestant on The Bachelorette. Then, he returned on The Bachelor. The whole time, Underwood had a secret that he wasn’t even admitting to himself. He was gay.

Underwood shared in an interview with Variety that there was only one gay person in the small midwest town where he grew up, and that person was “the butt of every joke.” He didn’t have any positive gay role models in his life, and he didn’t see being gay as an option. Yet, deep down, he fought back the thought that he might be gay.

Earlier in 2021, Underwood sat down for an interview with Good Morning America host Robin Roberts to admit to the world that he was gay. He claimed that the pandemic was what caused him to stop running from the truth about his sexuality.

During the interview with Roberts, Underwood left out one very important piece of information. A year earlier, he had visited a spa in Los Angeles that mainly caters to gay men. Shortly after leaving the spa, he received an email from someone claiming that he had taken nude photos of The Bachelor star while he was at the spa.

Underwood was terrified he would be outed, so he decided to forward the email to his publicist, and the two had a conversation in which Underwood finally had to come to terms with his sexuality. Underwood told Variety, “I knew that out of anybody in my world, my publicist wasn’t going to ruin me.”

According to Underwood, until the incident at the spa, he hadn’t even admitted to himself that he was gay, and he planned to live his entire life as a straight man. In fact, he says that he really did fall in love with Cassie Randolph while on the show. He thought she might be able to make him straight, and he never told her he thought he might be gay. He hasn’t even talked to her about it since the GMA interview.

Although Underwood was originally fearful about coming out, now, he has no regrets. He told Variety, “I want a partner and husband more than anything. I want a family. I want kids. I want dogs. I want the whole 9 yards. I never knew that was possible until I came out and I got to do research and meet people and ask questions and actually lean into my truth.”

Does it surprise you that Underwood came out because he was blackmailed? Were you surprised when Underwood came out as gay on GMA?