It seems the Bachelor has angered not just reality TV fans but an entire state.
Sorry, but the latest Bachelor isn't welcome in Minnesota.
Arie Luyendyk Jr. angered fans for pulling a fiance swap on The Bachelor finale this week. His brutal breakup to Becca Kurfin was aired unedited on Monday's finale, and then on Tuesday, he proposed to his runner-up, Lauren Burnham, on After the Rose. In doing so, he earned the dubious honor of becoming the first Bachelor to propose to two women in one season.
Becca wasn't the only person pissed. Minnesota Representative Drew Christensen was so annoyed by Arie, he authored a bill banning Arie from the state. Why the Land of 10,000 Lakes? Becca is from Prior Lake, Minnesota, which is repped by Christensen.
"I’m a man of my word—here’s the bill banning Arie. #TheBachelor
#mnleg," Christensen tweeted along with photos of the bill for the act, as well as his signature on it.
"The state of Minnesota hereby adopts a policy of zero tolerance of Arie Luyendyk, Jr. from season 22 of The Bachelor," his letter reads. "It is state policy that every person in the state has a right to live free from the presence of Arie Luyendyk, Jr. in the state."
The Republican rep had originally said he'd ban Arie from his state if he got 1,000 retweets -- and he ended up scoring 12,000.
Christensen also offered to invite Becca to be his guest of honor at Minnesota's State of the State Address next week, though that sadly hasn't reached the 10,000 votes he's requested yet.
As for why Arie decided to film and subsequently air his breakup with Becca, the 36-year-old race car driver told ET he wanted "no questions on that breakup."
"I know that it's a very public relationship, and I think that doing that on camera would just let everyone know that that decision was solely mine, and it told the story of how I ended up here, with [Lauren]," he said.
Bachelor host Chris Harrison explained to ET that he gets why fans didn't care for Arie's quick proposal to Lauren and "thought it might be in bad taste."
"Everybody watching the show just went through this [breakup with Becca], they’re just living it, and that’s one thing I don’t ever expect the contestants to understand," he said. "I understand it as a producer and the host of this show; things that take months to take shape and things that have happened months ago are playing out in minutes to the viewer. So, it’s hard for people to digest. It’s coming so fast. So, I understand how the timing could be shocking and throw everybody off."
"I don’t think people have seen the time and energy Lauren and Arie have put into their relationship," he continued. "But even with that said, I totally get why people were a little thrown off. I took the read of the audience last night and nobody knew what to do [after the proposal]. I even made mention of that on the air, which normally I wouldn’t have done, but I could just feel there was this awkward, "We’re not sure what to do" feeling. So I thought, That’s how everybody at home is feeling."
Find out more about Arie and Lauren's wedding plans in the video below.
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