Love Island USA Season 7 ends with Amaya Espinal and Bryan Arenales winning $100K amid racism controversies and cast exits. Photos/X.
The seventh season of Love Island Season 7 came to an end on July 13, with Amaya Espinal and Bryan Arenales declared the winners in a finale clouded by controversy.
Espinal and Arenales, who became America’s favorite couple through viewer votes, took home the Season 7 crown along with a $100,000 prize. Their win capped off a dramatic season of the Peacock reality dating series, which started airing on June 3.
Nic Vansteenberghe and Olandria Carthen finished in second place after securing the runner-up spot via the show’s voting app. The other two finalist couples were Iris Kendall and Pepe Garcia-Gonzalez, and Huda Mustafa and Chris Seeley.
In the episode just before the finale, original islanders Chelley Bissainthe and Ace Greene were eliminated from the villa following a public vote.
Fans won’t have to wait long for a post-season catch-up. A reunion special has been confirmed for Monday, August 25, at 9 p.m. ET.
While Love Island USA typically focuses on romance, games, and neon-lit parties, Season 7 also faced serious backlash over racism controversies involving two cast members.
Starting contestant Yulissa Escobar left the villa early without much explanation. Narrator Iain Stirling simply told viewers, “Yulissa has left the villa.”
Then, on July 6, another contestant, Cierra Ortega, who was in a strong couple with runner-up Nic Vansteenberghe, also exited the show. Stirling explained her departure by saying she “has left the villa due to a personal situation.”
In the past several contestants left the villa mid-season for various reasons and is considered common, however, this year’s departures were linked to controversies surrounding both Escobar and Ortega’s past online behavior.
Video clips of Escobar, a 27-year-old businesswoman from Miami, surfaced online before even the show brgan. She faced backlash for using a racial slur on a podcast.
She later apoligized while posting on her social media, “I’m sorry for using a word I had no right in using.”
Simillarly, screenshots emerged of alleged recent Instagram posts by Prtega a week before her departyre. In the post she used a racial slur against people of Asian descent, referencing her eyes in the process. The posts triggered widespread online outrage.
In response, Ortega’s family spoke out against viewers who they claimed had reported the family to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Ortega, who is from Arizona but lives in Los Angeles, is of Mexican and Puerto Rican heritage.
Within days of her exit, Ortega released a nearly five-minute “accountability video” on social media. In the video, she apologized to “the entire Asian community,” saying, “I had no idea that the word held as much pain, as much harm, and came with the history that it did, or I never would have used it.”
Throughout the season, Love Island USA issued statements on air and online condemning “cyberbullying, harassment (and) hate,” addressing the heated conversations happening among viewers.
Zubair Amin is a Senior Journalist at NewsX with over seven years of experience in reporting and editorial work. He has written for leading national and international publications, including Foreign Policy Magazine, Al Jazeera, The Economic Times, The Indian Express, The Wire, Article 14, Mongabay, News9, among others. His primary focus is on international affairs, with a strong interest in US politics and policy. He also writes on West Asia, Indian polity, and constitutional issues. Zubair tweets at zubaiyr.amin
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