Big Brother 13 winner Rachel Reilly has quit Twitter following the backlash she's experienced for appearing in a video where Evel Dick Donato said the n-word. Rachel first competed on BB12, where she met her now-husband Brendon Villegas. They were big personalities and a high-profile couple on the show, which prompted them both to come back the following year for BB13. The twist on season 13 was that the houseguests had to compete in pairs for a few weeks. Moreover, three notable Big Brother pairs returned to compete on the show: Rachel Reilly and Brendon Villegas, Daniele Donato and Evel Dick, and Jordan Lloyd and Jeff Schroeder.
It was on Big Brother 13 that Rachel and Dick played together on the show. They were never such close friends in public, but she did appear a few times on Dick @ Nite, his digital series that brings in reality TV stars to talk about ongoing seasons. This week, BB18 and BB19 runner-up Paul Abrahamian shared a clip from one of Evel Dick's live-streams that featured Rachel Reilly and her sister Elissa Slater. This took place in 2014, so they were talking about Big Brother 16. In the clip shared by Paul, Dick Donato explicitly said the n-word and justified that he had Black friends who allowed him to use the word.
In the clip shared by Paul, Big Brother stars Rachel and Elissa clearly reacted with shock - but they went about it in different ways, and certain fans didn't like that. Elissa sat in front of her camera not knowing what to say, and Rachel tried to shut it down by making a joke. The short clip didn't show if they said anything else, but Evel Dick has said in a tweet (seen below) that Rachel did say something to him immediately. Dick added, "So any hate should be directed at me, not Rachel or Elissa." Nonetheless, the fans sent flooded Twitter to express their concern and outrage at those who were involved in this situation. Between the night on Friday, October 16 and the morning on Saturday, October 17, Rachel Reilly deactivated her Twitter (as seen below) without warning.
Then, a Big Brother fan sent a tweet (seen below) to Rachel and Elissa offering some empathy. The fan said, "Let Rachel know we still love her and hate on line bullies that made her delete her account." Rachel's sister, Elissa Slater, replied to the fan thanking them. In the tweet (also seen below), Elissa added, "She's 8 months pregnant so very hormonal & emotional." This seems to imply that Rachel took the drastic measure of deleting her Twitter because she's currently more emotional than ever, considering that she's pregnant. It is also of note that this whole situation took place on Friday, October 16, which was Rachel's birthday.
It's a shame that Rachel and Elissa are being dragged into a situation that is clearly about holding Dick Donato accountable. Rachel and Elissa's reactions in the video were pretty standard for guests on a show that weren't expecting the host to say such a thing. In the end, Rachel and Elissa did stand up to the fact that Dick couldn't say the n-word, but they had a non-confrontational approach just like any other guest on any other talk show would've done.
Big Brother 22: All-Stars airs Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays at 8pm EST on CBS.