Some Billie Eilish fans are breathing a sigh of relief today, as the 21-year-old pop star and Jesse Rutherford, the 31-year-old singer of the band The Neighbourhood, have broken up after several months of dating.
People confirmed the news Wednesday afternoon, with a representative for Eilish telling the mag: “We can confirm Billie and Jesse did split amicably and remain good friends. All cheating rumors are false. Both are currently single.”
Eilish and Rutherford were first confirmed as a couple in October 2022, when the Grammy winner was 20 years old. Their 11-year age gap was not taken kindly by many of Eilish’s fans, nor were the rumors that she and Rutherford first met when she was a teenager. Prior to confirming their relationship, Eilish and Rutherford had attended a Halloween party together dressed as a baby and a grandpa, respectively, in a truly cringeworthy attempt to get ahead of the critical narrative that he was too old to be dating her.
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Amid the age gap controversy, Eilish’s older brother, Finneas, defended her, saying, “I want my sister to be happy and safe and she is a 21-year-old adult perfectly entitled to make her own life decisions.”
And while he was certainly right—Eilish, a legal adult, has every right to make her own choices—her comments about Rutherford during the course of their relationship rubbed some fans the wrong way, as some thought she saw him as a prize she’d lucked into winning. Last October, for example, Eilish told Vanity Fair that she was proud Rutherford even knew who she was, let alone that they were a couple.
“I managed to get my way to a point in my life, my life to a point, where I not only was known by a person that I thought was the hottest fucking fucker alive, but pulled his ass,” Eilish said. “Are you kidding me? Can we just—round of applause for me? Thank you. Jesse Rutherford, everyone. I pulled his ass. All me. I did that shit. I locked that motherfucker down.”
A stunning, seven-time Grammy winner being astonished that she managed to convince a homely dude 10 years her senior with one big hit to date her? That may have been even darker than When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?.
