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Julie Chen Weighs In On Jack Matthews’ ‘Obsession Of Hating’ Evicted ‘Big Brother’ Houseguest Kemi Fakunle

By Victoria Miller
Published on: 06:39 PST, Jul 19, 2019

Big Brother host Julie Chen is as confused as viewers are by houseguest Jack Matthews’ hate for now-evicted player Kemi Fakunle. The longtime CBS host weighed in on footage of Jack’s tirade against Kemi over a water bottle she put in the cast’s communal refrigerator, and she is clearly on Team Kemi.

In the clip that aired on Thursday night’s live show, Kemi questioned Jack’s clear hatred of her while recounting the fight in a Diary Room confessional, noting that his obsession with hating EHR is “confusing.”

Kemi also said if she were to stay in the Big Brother game, her No. 1 mission would be to get Jack out of the house

“The main reason that I want to come back into the game is to take Jack out of it. If I had a to-do list, it would have one item: Vengeance.”

Unfortunately, Kemi, a Camp Comeback recruit, didn’t win the “Path of Redemption” contest that would have allowed her to return to the game, so she won’t be able to seek revenge against her Big Brother nemesis. But the Brooklyn-based marketing strategist does have the support of Julie Chen, who has seen it all after hosting 21 seasons of the CBS reality show.

Chen took to Twitter to quote Kemi’s observation about Jack, then added that a lot of people agree with her that his behavior is confusing. Several fans responded to Chen’s tweet to note that Jack’s obsession isn’t confusing, “it’s racism.”

“Can America evict a houseguest? Because that’s a twist we need,” another fan asked of the Big Brother powers-that-be.

In case you missed the fight footage, here’s what happened: Before her eviction from the Big Brother game, Jack told Kemi that she had no business putting her water bottle in the fridge.

In a condescending manner, Jack informed Kemi that he was telling her — out of “respect” for her — that she needs help “with a little bit of perspective.”

He then pointed out that she has “a tendency” to put her shaker bottle in the fridge and her drinks in the freezer.

“If all of us put our shaker bottles in the fridge, what would it look like?” Jack said, per Oprahmag.com. “What is so special about you that you get to put it in there?”

When Kemi explained that she put her drinks in the refrigerator because there was “space,” Jack pointed out that if everyone else did it, there would be no room in the fridge for anything else. He then said the rest of the houseguests “sacrifice” not having their stuff cold and “prep ice appropriately” so that they can have cold drinks without monopolizing the fridge space.

Jack then unconvincingly added that he thinks Kemi is great and an awesome person and didn’t want his comments toward her to be taken as derogatory.

There has been a lot of controversy about racism in the Big Brother house. While Julie Chen has not remarked on allegations that racist talk has been captured on the CBS live feeds this season, she has admitted that in some past seasons it has been difficult to watch.

“We can’t really manage the house guests, because you can’t dilute or infect the game,” Chen told The Hollywood Reporter in 2015.

“The thing that was hardest for me to watch was when we had overt racism in the house.”

Big Brother airs Sundays, Wednesdays and Thursdays on CBS.

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