Even Jesse Palmer didn’t see Jenn Tran’s love story with Devin Strader ending in heartbreak.
“When I found out, I felt a lot of emotions. I was sad. I was heartbroken for Jenn,” Jesse, 45, said in an interview with Entertainment Weekly published on Thursday, September 5. “I was confused. I never anticipated this happening considering everything that I saw happen between the two of them in Hawaii.”
During the Bachelorette finale, which aired on Tuesday, September 3, fans learned that Jenn, 26, and Devin, 28, called off their engagement shortly after she proposed to him.
“People in the audience were shocked, as I’m sure people were at home watching,” Jesse reflected. “We had never seen Jenn so emotional, and as difficult as that must have been for her to recount, she showed incredible strength and bravery.”
Meanwhile, Jesse doesn’t think Devin has properly addressed “why things ended, or what changed” between him and Jenn. When the proposal was shown during the episode, Jenn was seen getting teary-eyed while sitting next to Devin. While Jesse admitted it was “hard” to watch Jenn in that moment, he’s proud of how she handled it.
“I think we also saw an empowered woman, doing things on her terms,” he gushed. “I couldn’t be more excited for what’s next for Jenn, and I know she’s going to be great on Dancing with the Stars!”
Following her season, Jenn was announced as one of the celebrities competing for the mirrorball on Dancing With the Stars season 33. In an exclusive interview with Us Weekly, Jenn shared that she wasn’t surprised by Devin’s casual nature at After the Final Rose.
“That’s kind of just been the way he’s been after the breakup,” Jenn told Us on Wednesday, September 4. “I was not expecting anything different. He hadn’t been responding to my calls and whatnot, so I didn’t think that he was gonna be emotional.”
Jenn added that she “knew” her proposal to Devin was going to air going into After the Final Rose and she wanted her ex-fiancé to watch back the moment.
“There were no surprises. They knew it was gonna be a very emotional night for me, so I knew it was gonna happen,” she explained. “And honestly, I wanted him to watch it back, too.”
According to Jenn, things were just as awkward behind the scenes as they looked on camera.
“I wasn’t really looking at him much. I was in my own mood, and he was like, ‘Why aren’t you looking at me?’” she recalled the exes’ tension between commercial breaks. “I’m like, ‘Well, ’cause you kind of suck!’”
