Ashley Iaconetti and Jared Haibon are unfazed by her ex-boyfriend Kevin Wendt’s accusations that she cheated on him with her now-fiancé.
“I was just a little confused by [his claims],” Iaconetti, 30, told Us Weekly exclusively at the Disney/ABC Television All-Star Happy Hour at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills on Tuesday, August 7. “I definitely told him directly that Jared and I were together before it was a public thing. He made it sound like he was clueless to it.”
That said, the Bachelor alum hopes Wendt, 34, whom she briefly dated earlier this year after meeting on Bachelor Winter Games, finds love on season 5 of Bachelor in Paradise.
“I told him it was a good idea to do Paradise. I wanted to see him on Paradise,” Iaconetti — who met Haibon, 29, on season 2 of the ABC summer reality series in 2015 — told Us. “I know he really has daddy fever, and I want him to find somebody who he loves and can have a family with.”
Haibon echoed similar sentiments. “I have nothing against him. He’s an ex of Ashley’s. I have exes. I wish him the best,” he told Us. “Obviously it’s awkward watching an ex of her’s on Paradise, but that’s the world we live in, the world we chose to be a part of. I agree, I hope he finds somebody.”
Iaconetti added that she and Wendt “never had any bad blood,” so she will continue “rooting for him.”
The Bachelorette Canada alum accused the journalist of being unfaithful on Tuesday’s premiere of Paradise. He noted that just a few months after they called it quits in March, she began dating Haibon.
“When Ashley and I left Winter Games, I knew I wanted to marry her one day. And then all of a sudden, Jared flips the switch and now he wants to be with her,” Wendt claimed on the show. “I did try to make it work, but if you kiss another guy while you’re dating someone else, it’s cheating in my book. That really hurt me.”
Iaconetti and Haibon announced in June that they are engaged. He proposed on a beach in Mexico on the set of Paradise.
Bachelor in Paradise airs on ABC Mondays and Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET.
