Cheryl Burke used her appearance on Chris Harrison‘s podcast to finally find out why she didn’t end up on The Bachelorette.
During the Monday, October 23, episode of “The Most Dramatic Podcast Ever,” Burke, 39, claimed she was previously told by producers that Harrison, 52, shut down the idea to have her on the show.
“I heard you blocked that. Did you not?” Burke asked before the franchise’s former host clarified, “No. They put that on me. Yeah, like I have that much power, like I have the power to decide who the Bachelor [or] Bachelorette is.”
Harrison, who exited the franchise in 2021, noted that he didn’t have as much input as viewers might have thought. “They — in public — would never give me that kind of power to decide who the Bachelor [or] Bachelorette is,” he continued. “I mean, [creator] Mike [Fleiss] would ask me or, you know, or somebody would ask, like, ‘Hey, like, what do you think about Emily Maynard? What do you think about Jason Mesnick or whatever?’ And I give my two cents.”
Burke said she heard Harrison allegedly vetoed her involvement in the show and referred to her as “sloppy drunk.” Harrison, meanwhile, confessed he found the rumors “funny” after hearing them for the first time. (Us Weekly has reached out to ABC for comment.)
The former Dancing With the Stars pro further claimed that producers “blamed” the decision on Harrison without his knowledge. While Burke didn’t offer details on when the discussion took place, her personal life made headlines last year following her split from Matthew Lawrence.
The former couple started dating in 2007 when Matthew’s older brother, Joey Lawrence, appeared as a contestant on season 3 of Dancing With the Stars. One year later, Burke and Matthew, 43, called it quits before rekindling their romance in 2017.
Burke officially filed for divorce in January 2022, and the proceedings were finalized eight months later. Matthew has since moved on with TLC’s Chilli — and he is excited about their future.
“That’s the game plan, [to have kids]. That’s what we’re trying to do,” he told Entertainment Tonight in March. “My life is in complete bloom right now. I get to spend time with an amazing woman like Chilli. I’ve never gotten to be able to experience that kind of relationship before. She’s really, really special.”
Matthew also praised the singer, 52, for raising son Tron, 26, with ex Dallas Austin. “She’s an amazing person,” he told E! News that same month. “She’s already a mother, she has an incredible son. I respect so much as to how she’s raised him. She’d be an incredible mother again, and I’d be incredibly lucky but that’s way in the future.”
After hearing her ex’s glowing comments, Burke publicly supported Matthew’s relationship with Chilli.
“He comes from a huge family and there were definitely conversations [about it when we were together],” she told Harrison on his podcast in March. “There were discussions about freezing my eggs. I really do wish him well. … I really, truly hope he can actually have a kid with Chilli. I think that’s amazing. I think he’s wanted that.”
Burke, for her part, is focused on her own mental health as she enters the dating scene again. “I need to believe and love myself enough to really know that I deserve a good guy,” she exclusively told Us in May 2022. “This is just untraining my brain. I need to not be like, ‘Why do I attract certain men?’ Versus, like, ‘Why do certain men disgust me?’ It’s being proactive in trying to stay present and conscious and know my self-worth. And a lot of that is still in the works.”
