Kelly Ripa Addresses Backlash Over Joke About Son Michael’s ‘Poverty’

Kelly Ripa is receiving backlash over a joke she made about her son Michael experiencing “poverty,” and is now addressing the controversy head on after some Instagram users shared their opinions on a photo of the daytime host and her son, which prompted her to respond.

“Michael goes to college and is a senior and works full time. He is in his first non parent subsidized apt with roommates. I’m used to getting a lot of slack (sic) because people love to have fake outrage over something they didn’t see. They only read a headline and wag their tired fingers. I didn’t grow up privileged and neither did [Mark]. We work and we expect our kids to as well. And the fact that a pack of fools want to b— about them, i say let em.”

Ripa’s seemingly controversial comments came during her appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! earlier this week, where she spoke about what life has been like for Michael since he graduated college and started living on his own.

“I think he loves the freedom. He hates paying his own rent and he’s chronically poor,” she joked. “I don’t think he ever really experienced extreme poverty like now.” The former soap opera actress went on to share that Michael always gets a gift of money from his grandmother for Halloween, which he would be indifferent to, but now that he has more financial responsibilites he is looking forward to it.

“Now that he’s living on his own, he’s called three times, ‘Halloween envelope arrived?’ Just so he can have electricity. He’s experiencing being an adult,” she said.

Ripa later joked about the day she and husband, Mark Consuelos, dropped Michael off for his freshman year of college, recounting, “We drop him off at his dorm. We have lunch together. We look at each other. We say, ‘We did it. We have a child in college. We did it! Oh my gosh.’”

“We come home. It’s about 10 minutes away. We walk through the front door and he is standing in the hallway,” she went on to share, to laughs from the audience.

While many have been critical of Ripa’s comments she has found some supporters, such as one Instagram follower who wrote, “I watched Kimmel when you were on, and I just knew that no matter what came out of your mouth, the social media trolls were gonna jump all over it.”

The fan later added, “In this day and age, it’s more important than ever to instill a sense of responsibility and work ethic in our children so that they too can grow up to be civilized, well-rounded humans with something to offer society. I believe that’s just common sense. Good on you and [Mark] for creating good and decent humans!”